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THE CASTAWAYS OF 
BANDA SEA 


THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO 
DALLAS • ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 


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THE CASTAWAYS OF 
BANDA SEA 


BY 

WARREN H. MILLER 

AUTHOR OF “SEA FIGHTERS,” ETC. 


jQeto gorfc 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1921 


All rights reserved 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 



Copyright, 1921, 

By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY f 
Set up and printed. Published October, 1921. 


OCT -5 1921 



FERRIS 

PRINTING COMPANY 
NEW YORK CITY 


. \X 

© Cl. A 6 2 4 6 5 5 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Castaways of Banda Sea . . 3 

II. “Pearl Atoll” . . . . . r# , 25 

III. Beached on Ke’ . . . . . . 53 

IV. In Dyak Land 77 

V. The Midget Steamer 103 

VI. A Black Leopard of Sumatra . . 13 1 

VII. In Quest of Paradise Birds t . . . 148 

VIII. Rajah George . . . . 174 



THE CASTAWAYS OF 
BANDA SEA 


CHAPTER I 

THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

George Sloan awoke with a cough and a gasp from 
his pandanus-leaf mat on the deck of the pearl 
schooner, Kawani. The boy’s eyes ran tears, for an 
acrid odor of burnt pine and oakum filled the air, and 
even in the gray of early dawn the cracks in the decks 
glowed red, for under her hatches the Kawani was 
all afire and had been for days. It was a race against 
time for Amboina on Ceram, still two hundred miles 
away. Down below, the fire was eating the heart out 
of the little trading schooner, while the tar bubbled 
in her seams and wisps of smoke rose in steady streams 
from her decks. One could not move about, except 
along the flat taffrail of her bulwarks. 

George sat up, rubbing his swollen eyelids. Then 
he jumped, to his feet with a hoarse cry of dismay. 

“Father,” he shrieked, “our boat’s gone !” 

Captain Jack Sloan looked up hurriedly from where 
he was nodding over the wheel in the faint, early light. 

3 


4 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


“Look at the after cleat !” yelled George, running 
aft along the taffrail. “The niggers got away in our 
boat, last watch!” 

“Jerusha’s Cats!” roared Captain Jack. “They 
must have slipped over the side and then come up 
from behind and cast loose the painter while I was 
tending wheel !” 

“Well, she’s gone — and we’re alone on this fire- 
pot,” groaned his son bitterly. “She won’t last an- 
other day, I’ll bet.” 

“Lord bless you, son — we’ll drive her over to 
Amboina, don’t you worry!” reassured the father 
cheerily. “We must be half-way over Banda Sea by 
now, and the southeast monsoon’s holding good.” 

“Well — let’s eat!” shrugged the boy, his round full 
face, with the bold, fearless blue eyes that his father 
had come to rely upon, breaking into a cheerful grin. 
“Sorry cookee left without giving notice, but I’ll shake 
up a little something and relieve you at the wheel at 
eight bells.” 

He set about dishing up a feed of eggs, yams, and 
bananas, frying the hen-seed in pork fat on the ship’s 
stove, which had been set up on deck. Everything 
needful had been brought topside, and the main hatch 
and cabin doors and hatches hermetically sealed and 
caulked when the cargo fire had got beyond control 
three days ago, so that the Kawani’s deck now looked 
like a camp. 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 5 

The tropical sun came up like a fiery thundercloud 
in the east, rising in a great ball of fire over the 
glassy Banda Sea, and the smooth combers of the 
steady old monsoon. The schooner’s sails hung out 
broad abeam. It was so calm that they did not have 
to touch a rope. There was nothing to do but watch 
for smoke bursts, and caulk them with oakum as fast 
as the fire ate away a crack in the deck. 

At sunrise the Captain took a time sight with the 
sextant, and George worked out the longitude as 
13 1 0 n' 26" East; and at noon the latitude shot gave 
them 5 0 1' 14" South of the equator. 

“Wal’r,” rumbled Captain Jack, “that gives us 190 
miles yet to Amboina, son, and we’re about no miles 
due west of Ke\ No use goin’ there. The December 
fleet of proas has already gone on to Aru, and we’d 
never get away from there for six months, until the 
July monsoon. We just gotta make Amboina in the 
old hooker.” 

“Gosh, father, when we do get there, please sell 
your pearls and let’s get a steamer back home to 
’Frisco and a train to Gloucester,” begged the boy 
earnestly. “It’s too hot to live, down here! Seems 
to me I’d give every pearl in your wallet for just one 
breath of good old Massachusetts air! Or one good 
sight of Thatcher’s Lights again! It’s more like five 
centuries than five years that we’ve been down here,” 
complained the boy. “I’d rather have a little twenty- 


6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


five-ton haddocker all my own to sail, and put in 
the coldest winter on George’s Banks, than make a 
million down here!” 

'‘Waal, boy, it’s about time we pulled out,” agreed 
the Captain. “They say fishin’s good up Gloucester 
way now, and Lord love ye, we’ll have money enough 
to buy two schooners, once we get over to Amboina 
and sell our pearls !” 

The afternoon wore on, with the stifling heat shim- 
mering up from the hot decks, and the brown, chok- 
ing smoke wafting over them in waves. George went 
over the side and sat on the rudder, watching narrowly 
for sharks, during his father’s trick at the wheel. He 
was dashing water over himself and dangling his legs 
in the cool sea, when a shout from on deck recalled 
him. 

“George! Hi, George! — fire gettin’ out around the 
foremast!” hailed the Captain. “Come up — quick!” 

George swung up a boom-crotch rope hanging over 
the stern, and ran along the taffrail to where a shoot 
of flame licked up around the mast through the step 
hole. With mallet and wads of oakum he was driving 
in a fresh fire plug — when, Boom! with a smash of 
burning cinders, the whole oak mast partner gave way, 
exposing a deep, glowing hole below ! 

With a rush like an oil gusher, the pent-up flames 
licked up around the mast. Captain John lashed the 
wheel and dashed forward to help. They fed the 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 7 

fiery hole rope’s ends, blankets, mats, everything 
movable on deck, but all to no avail; for the fire ate 
them up like feathers, and then, with a dull roar, 
shot up along the mast. Instantly the foresail caught 
fire, and a second later the flame leaped over to the 
mainsail, and that, too, went up like a burning curtain. 
Showers of burning canvas and bits of blazing bolt- 
rope fell on the deck, and the Sloans dodged and fought 
among them as best they might. When it was all over, 
they were still alive, but the bare masts smoked above 
them, while a column of fire ran ceaselessly up the 
foremast. 

“We got to git the main hatch off and put her over- 
board, son,” shouted the Captain. “The ship’s gone, 
and it’s the only big thing that will float. Drop the 
main gaff, quick !” 

George ran to the fife rail and lowered the bare, 
swinging spar by its charred and smoking halliards. 
Cutting away as much of the rope as was too scorched 
to trust, they made a derrick of the boom and swung 
it around over the hatch. A purchase, of the two main 
sheet blocks, was rigged, and the rope fastened in the 
big ring-bolt in the center of the hatch. 

“Now, son, we got to act quick and smart, for when 
that hatch comes off, the whole schooner will be ablaze ! 
When I give the word, you knock away the hatch 
wedges and I’ll heave on the tackle. Ready, now — 
hand-some-ly !” 


8 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


George hopped on the sizzling hatch and drove out 
the wedges with his mallet. Then he jumped for the 
taffrail, as he felt the hatch lifting beneath him. It 
was hardly necessary for Captain Jack to heave up 
on the tackle ; the fire shot around the hatch rim, fair- 
ly bursting it off, like the lid of a steam kettle. A huge 
sheet of flame rose as they swung the boom, and the 
hatch teetered over the taffrail and dropped hissing 
into the sea. George leaped overboard and swam to it. 

“Look alive, now — catch ’em!” yelled his father, 
heaving over bedding, grub tins, their sea chest, sex- 
tant — everything movable on deck. Then he cast loose 
the big oak water butt and rolled it over the side. 
George secured it with a rope’s end, after which his 
father, ducking low under the roaring mass of flames 
that was now the Kawani, dived overboard and swam 
out to the hatch. 

“Well! — we’re alive, anyhow!” he grunted philo- 
sophically, as he crawled over the hatch rim. “The 
sharks can’t get us, and if no sea gets up and one of 
them proas comes along, we’ll get home, some time 
this century!” 

George grinned. “Regular Robinson Crusoe stuff, 
father!” he laughed. “Somehow it’s a relief to get off 
that old fire trap, though! You never can tell what 
fire’s up to down below. I’ve heard of ships that blew 
up trying to smother it with battened hatches.” 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 9 

Two days passed. Hot, they were, without a rag 
of shade, as, surrounded by a ring of expectant sharks, 
the hatch drifted helplessly on the Banda Sea. The 
sextant showed them working steadily toward the 
Banda volcano island to the east, but not going over 
fifteen miles a day, so variable are the currents in these 
seas. 

During all that time not a sail showed over the 
horizon. The trading fleet had gone by, and they 
were too far out to sight any small coasters. As for 
the steamer from Singapore to Australia, she was not 
due for two weeks yet. On the third day George 
was dozing against the grub box in the shade, when 
a sort of mirage — the mere ghost of something visible 
over the far horizon — made him jump up on the chest 
with a wild shout of relief. Three tiny sticks close 
together jutted up over the rim of the sea! 

“Sail ho, dad !” he yelled, rousing the Captain out of 
a sound sleep. His father joined him excitedly on 
the box lid. 

“Proa!” he pronounced. “Them’s her yard-ends. 
We gotta rig a signal mast, somehow.” 

“I reckon it’ll be me !” laughed the boy, ripping off 
his shirt. “We’ll take turns standing on the box and 
waving for them, seeing that we haven’t a spar on the 
raft.” 

The three distant stakes were now joined by a brown 
curve of matting, as the proa’s sail rose steadily out 


10 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


of the sea. She was bowling right along and her 
course would bring her within signaling distance, as 
the Captain noted with a grunt of satisfaction. 

“Got y'r automatic loaded,, son?” he asked George. 
“You never can tell what sort of birds ship in these 
proas. Jest as like to be Guinea pirates as not.” 

George slipped the compact little blue-steel auto- 
matic out of his hip pocket and examined its magazine 
clip, to be sure that it was ready for business. The 
stubby little .32 cartridges were perfectly good at short 
range, and he had ten shots quick with them. The proa 
sail had now developed into a large brown dipping lug, 
with the two long yardarms curving up like a cone. 
The body of the proa and its outrigger were as yet 
invisible. Nevertheless, George began waving the 
white shirt, so eager was he to be taken off the raft 
and get some man's food to eat, after three days of 
ship's biscuit and water. 

Ten minutes later the proa veered her big lateen sail 
over and started off on the other tack. 

“Yeeow ! Atta stuff ! — They’ve seen us and changed 
course, father!” yelled George exultingly. “Hooroo 
for home!” 

“Mebbe — mebbe!’' ventured the elder man cautious- 
ly. “Got to go slow on this, kid. Remember, silence 
is the word about those pearls !” 

The proa was not over two miles off now, and they 
could see that the crew were Javanese and Bugis, by 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA n 


the conical hats of Java and the turbans of the Moham- 
medan Bugis. 

“Thank the Lord they're not black birds, anyhow!" 
exclaimed the Captain contentedly. “We seem to be 
in luck, son. They're Malays — a treacherous lot. Be 
mighty careful what you say, boy. If they get any 
idea of those pearls, we’ll both be krissed the first 
night." 

Vigorously the crew of the proa shouted and ges- 
ticulated at them, for this tack had brought her close 
abeam. Her captain was a small, brown-faced Java- 
nese, with thin, regular features, a cruel, close-lipped 
mouth, and small, avaricious black eyes that glistened 
at them under his tall, conical straw hat. The proa 
let out her main sheet and hung idly floating, some 
twenty yards away from the raft, while a colloquy 
went on in Malay between Captain Jack and the Java- 
nese. 

“Where are they bound, father?" interrupted 
George, unable to restrain longer his eagerness. 

“Ke', son — we’ll have to make the best of it " 

“Kef !” echoed George, and there was a world of dis- 
appointment in his tone as he slumped down on the 
chest, heartsick with foreboding. Another long delay 
in getting home — and the future looked worse than 
blank!" 

“Now you've spilled the beans!" barked his father 
angrily. “Didn't I tell you to keep your mouth shut?. 


12 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


That Javanese is watching you — and Eve just told him 
we'd be real pleased to go to Ke\ We’d love it — we 
would! Now he more than suspects we’re pearlers.” 

George kicked himself, inwardly, and did his best 
to act pleased, but even he could see that the ruse was 
worse than wasted on the Javanese. Captain Jack 
soon made a dicker with him for the passage to Ke’ 
and their few belongings were transferred from the 
raft to the proa. 

As George stepped aboard, he examined her all over 
with a boy’s interest in a new and outlandish craft. 
She was about forty feet long, built entirely out of log 
planks carved and gouged out of the solid tree-trunk 
to fit their places in the shell of the boat, and each 
carved plank was joined to the next with wooden dowel 
pins, like the leaves of a table. The whole boat was 
then tied together with thin iron-wood cross-ribs, 
lashed to lugs on the planks with turns of rattan. 
George had been a great boat-builder as a small boy 
back in Gloucester. During those penniless days, he 
had often thought of cutting his own planks from trees 
in the forest and pinning them up to make a boat like 
this. Here was the real thing, built at Ke’ by the 
greatest boat-builders in the Malay Archipelago. The 
rigging, too, interested him. There was not a halliard 
or a block on the ship, for the upper yard of the big 
lateen sail was fastened to the top of a mast, made of 
three bamboo poles like a tripod. Two of these poles 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 13 

were pinned at their feet to the gunwales of the proa 
and met at the top in a wooden yoke, to which the third, 
the rear pole, was pinned. To raise the sail the Malays 
pushed up on this third pole, when the other two would 
rise about their pins like a pair of shears, taking the 
yard up with them. The lower yard stayed down of 
its own weight and had two ropes tied to it, a tack and 
a sheet, by which the sail could be hauled around. 

The Javanese captain led them to a small rattan coop 
on deck and assigned them to the forward cabin of it, 
his own being the after one, with a mat screen dividing 
the two. Here they stowed the few possessions they 
had been able to save off the Kawani, and then went 
forward to where a Javanese cook was serving out a 
curry of rice and goat’s meat from a small charcoal 
brazier. George grabbed the carved wooden spoon 
handed to him by the cook and fell to with a will, his 
father seconding him scarcely less heartily. They 
studied the crew about them, curiously, as the proa 
bowled along towards Ke’, at about eight knots an 
hour. There were only six men and the captain, and 
all wore the cotton jackets and white sarongs of Java, 
and had krisses and parangs in wooden sheaths swing- 
ing at their belts. Two of the crew sat out on the 
outrigger, for the proa was very narrow, and they 
laughed and joked with those at mess, while their bare, 
brown feet paddled in the water atop the oblong, 
cigar-shaped body of the outrigger which dived along 


H THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

like a great fish under the bamboo poles securing 
it to the proa’s gunwales. 

“Gosh!” thought the boy to himself. “We two 
white men, with our automatics, are more than a match 
for the whole six! Wouldn’t I like to rush ’em and 
turn this hooker around for Amboina! I suppose 
father wouldn’t stand for it, though,” he sighed, aban- 
doning the impulse to propose the idea. He decided to 
lie awake that night, however, and keep watch in the 
rattan coop over his father, for it would be quite likely 
that the Javanese would search him for pearls, after 
that “break” he had made while they were bargaining 
for a passage. 

His father seconded the idea heartily, once they 
were alone in the cabin and could talk things over. 

“You certainly gummed the deck, son,” whispered 
the Captain, angrily. “Either we are copra traders, 
in which case we’d just as leave go to Ke’ as anywhere 
else, or we are pearlers. And, in this sea we could be 
headed for just one port, Amboina, if we had pearls — 
and you gave the game away. We’ll have to take 
watches, turn and turn about, so long as we are on 
this ship. I’ll sleep the first watch, for it will be easier 
for you to stay awake, then.” 

That evening the sun set in a golden ball of fire over 
the rim of the sea to the west, and George sat beside 
the Mohammedan steersman, the jurumuddi, watching 
the flow of phosphorescent flashes eddying around the 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 15 

starboard rudder — for there were two of them, one 
for each tack. 

His father retired early, and the boy followed soon 
after, to take up his watch, lying across the small door 
of the coop. It was black as pitch inside, and the cabin 
smelled sweet and grassy of the vegetable scents of 
palm and pandanus leaves and rattan. It made him 
drowsy, and the thick mat under him felt good after 
two nights on the hard boards of the hatch. He was 
dozing off, in spite of himself, when a faint rustling 
somewhere in the cabin made him sit up, wide awake. 

The boy listened intently, trying to locate the sound 
in the pitchy blackness. He decided that it came from 
the thatch wall behind the bunk where his father lay 
sleeping, and he crept over there, noiselessly. The 
Captain breathed deeply, with the stertorous breath of 
one dog-tired and sound asleep, as George’s hand crept 
softly over his broad chest. Then he lunged forward 
with a shiver of excitement, for, up near the Captain’s 
neck his hand encountered a long, skinny mess of cold, 
clammy fingers! He gripped it savagely, but the 
greasy hand squirmed through his like a live eel, and 
was gone through the leafy screen of the partition. 

Stifling a cry of astonishment, the boy instantly 
plunged his hand under the Captain’s collar and felt 
for the bag of pearls. It was gone ! 

A sickening feeling of utter hopelessness assailed 


1 6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


him. This was the end of everything. If they were 
not krissed or thrown to the sharks on the morrow, 
or even if delivered alive at Ke’, they would be a pair 
of wretched beach-combers, and would have to begin 
all over again, to even earn enough money to get over 
to Amboina. The pearls must be recovered. They 
would be somewhere on the proa, but where the Java- 
nese would hide them, he could not in the least con- 
jecture. Then an idea swept over him. Suppose he 
were already hiding them? Certainly not in his own 
cabin, nor anywhere on him, for he would know well 
that the white men would hold him up for them, just 
as soon as they discovered the theft. George got up 
and crept out of the cabin onto the starlit deck. Fie 
had but one idea, to watch the Javanese’s door until 
morning, to see that he could not get out of his own 
cabin without detection. That, at least, would locate 
the pearls in one known spot on the ship. 

He crept around the corner of the rattan coop, and 
listened carefully. Not a sound came to his ears. The 
stars grouped around the Southern Cross swung 
brightly overhead and he could see fairly well in the 
gloom. There would be a single Javanese on watch 
forward, and a Mohammedan steersman aft, as the 
day watch were asleep down in the waist. He edged 
over to the Javanese’s door and listened inside. There 
was not even a sound of breathing. 'J'hen he worked 
over to the other corner. A white, hatless figure was 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 17 

standing up near the foremast! It must be the Java- 
nese captain, he realized, for the crew on watch wore 
conical hats. 

After a time the man came silently back, and George 
withdrew without being seen and reentered his own 
cabin. Boring his knuckles in the Captain’s side, he 
woke him and whispered him the situation. 

“Thunder and Mars!” ejaculated the Captain under 
his breath. “Bring your automatic, son! We’ll hold 
up this bird, right now!” 

“What’s the use, father?” begged the boy earnestly. 
“There’d only be the devil of a row, and maybe a 
shooting, and we could prove nothing on the Javanese. 
Let’s lay low. I think I know where they are, and 
we’ll get them back before we get to Ke’. That’s the 
big thing, now.” 

The Captain pondered awhile. “Guess you’re right, 
son,” he muttered. “We’ll have to act as if nothing 
had happened, and watch our chance. At that, the 
pearls may be on him, too, you know. Jerusha’s Cats, 
but we’re out of luck !” 

George was up early to investigate. The two tall 
bamboo legs of the foremast towered aloft, carrying 
the long yard of the sail at the yoke up near their tops, 
but there was nothing that he could see anywhere that 
would make a hiding place for anything at all. Still, 
here was where the Javanese stood last night. That 
was all he had to go on. 


18 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


He went back to the cabin to report, before the Java- 
nese captain appeared on deck. 

“We’ll have to stick close together, son,” rumbled 
the Captain, “for their next move will be to pick a fake 
fight with us and either tip us overboard or perhaps 
kriss us in a fight. Now that he has the pearls, that 
Javanese will not rest until he gets rid of us before he 
sights Ke’, I’m thinking.” 

The Javanese appeared on deck for breakfast. He 
greeted them with his usual cold civility, and there 
was not a sign on either side that anything out of the 
ordinary had happened. 

“It’s him, all right, though 1 ” muttered George to his 
father. “See the scratches on his hand, where my nails 
cut him ?” 

The Captain nodded. “Wait!” he counseled. 
“Something will develop, right sudden soon. We ratise 
Ke’ by noon.” 

Up in the eyes of the ship was a small lacquered 
shrine, and, after breakfast, the Javanese captain called 
together his three retainers and opened the doors, dis- 
closing a gilded Buddha within, mounted on a carved 
teak altar. They prostrated themselves before it, burn- 
ing joss sticks to appease the shark gods, lest any fall 
overboard and be caught by one of the monsters cir- 
cling constantly around the proa. Then another joss 
stick was burned, to placate the storm gods and give 
them fair weather, and still another to the haunts 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 19 

(spirits) down below, who controlled the adverse and 
variable currents in the sea, which were often setting 
them off their course and were seldom the same for any 
voyage across these seas. George watched the Javanese 
captain at prayer, curiously, as his father explained the 
meaning of the ceremonies. The pearls were hidden in 
or around the idol, he was convinced. He would have 
liked the chance to do some fine, manly, Christian deed 
for this Javanese that would make him act like a white 
man and restore them; but he felt, with a sigh, that 
this would be impossible. They were as far apart in 
their moral codes as the Poles. This man could be 
sincere and worship the Buddha with all the fervor of 
the highest-minded Christian, but it did not make him 
any the less a hypocrite that his conscience would per- 
mit him to steal the sole wealth of a couple of helpless 
castaways on his ship. No ; it would be a fight for their 
very lives, he realized, and to win back by righteous 
force instead of Christian Golden Rule the pearls that 
meant everything to them. 

George pondered on this, as the Javanese went 
through the forms of his prayers. His eyes rested 
idly on the base of the starboard bamboo leg of the 
foremast as he mused. Then he became aware that the 
Javanese, for all his prayers, was watching him nar- 
rowly out of the tail of his eye. There was ferocity 
in the look — as in the green glare one gets from a 
leopard, back in the dark depths of his cage — and there 


20 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


was suspicion there, too! Immediately George began 
to examine the foremast with more interest. That look 
meant something — he had seen that expression in a 
child’s eyes, when you get too “warm” near a hidden 
object. 

Abruptly the Javanese stopped the ceremonies, and, 
under pretext of excluding all foreigners from the 
sacred Buddha, ordered the Sloans, father and son, to 
their cabin. George went back, his eyes alight with 
the joy of discovery. 

“I tell you where the pearls are, father!” he cried. 
“Up somewhere near the foremast! You ought to 
have seen the look that fellow gave me just before he 
shooed us away ! I’ll prowl around up there, the next 
chance I get!” 

“Mebbe,” grunted the Captain, half-convinced. 
“It’s my bet that they’re hidden in or around the idol. 
The thing for us to do is to scheme out a way to search 
it. The off watch will go below soon, and the cook 
will get busy at his brazier and pans. That leaves one 
Javanese seaman only, for’d. You stay in here, and 
I’ll send him to you for a present, first chance I get, 
when the captain goes aft. Then’s my chance to get 
a look at that idol.” 

He went out, George watching him with many mis- 
givings, for they were now separated. He could see 
his father yarning with the Javanese lookout up in the 
forecastle, the proa captain lowering at him and hang- 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 21 


ing around suspiciously. After perhaps half an hour, 
the captain went aft, and presently the lookout poked 
his head into the cabin door. He grinned at George, 
engagingly, and seemed to be expecting something. 
The boy gave him an empty tin box out of his sea 
chest and kept him in play as long as he could, trying 
to tell a funny story by signs, which amused the sailor 
hugely. 

Then Captain Jack came back, and the sailor hur- 
ried forward to his duties. The Captain looked weary 
and disappointed. 

“There was not a danged thing in the shrine, and 
the idol was solid bronze,” he announced despondently. 
“It did not take a minute to see that the back of the 
shrine was against the solid teak bulkhead of the fore- 
peak, and there were no drawers anywhere in it, and 
the sides were of plain teak boards. That scoundrel 
either has them on him yet or has hidden them some- 
where else. We’ll have to look alive about this, son, 
for we’re already rising Ke’ to the east. I’ve got a 
good mind to hold up that son-of-a-sea-cook right now 
— doggone, if I don’t!” he exclaimed impetuously, 
rising and drawing his automatic. 

“Wait a bit, father!” interrupted George. “It’s my 
trick at the wheel. You keep near me, but not too 
near, and I’ll have a look at that foremast.” 

Leaving the cabin he worked along deck, keeping 
the rattan coop between him and the Javanese captain 


22 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


aft, who was talking to the steersman. George exam- 
ined the foot of the foremast carefully. A single crack 
went from top to bottom of the first bamboo joint. 
It was an ordinary weather crack, such as old bamboo 
is full of, but George’s heart beat wildly with hope, for 
on the forward side might be another one. He stooped 
down quickly and examined it. On the forward side 
was an identical crack, in the same joint! Feverishly 
he whipped out his clasp knife and dug it in, in the 
upper corner of the joint. It sprung a little, showing 
a close-fitted, hair-line crack in the upper joint of the 
bamboo. Prying with all his strength, he bent the 
hollow wood outward, and then an interior fastening 
gave way with a sharp snap, and the small bamboo door 
in the mast swung open. Inside was the wallet of 
pearls ! 

George reached in his hand. But he drew it back 
hastily and attempted to rise, for a warning shout from 
his father and the swift patter of bare feet on the deck 
made him turn about. The Javanese captain was rush- 
ing at him with drawn kriss, snarling a riot of Malay 
curses. 

A man can strike far quicker with his fist than he can 
with a heavy knife, and George lunged up at the Java- 
nese with the swift up-spring of a boxer. His fist 
met the oncoming jaw of his adversary with a sharp 
crack, and knocked him flat on the deck. Like a 
leopard, the Javanese leaped to his feet, came at George 


THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 23 

again, and made a murderous lunge with the kriss 
that brought doom to himself, for, as George’s arm 
shot up to ward off the threatening knife, the Malay’s 
foot tripped and he overswung with the slashing drive 
of the heavy kriss, plunging headlong over the side 
with the momentum of his blow ! 

A yell came from the steersman aft as he swung 
the proa in a big circle, but she swept by the struggling 
man, striking out hurriedly in the water. He dropped 
astern, and then, under their horrified eyes, a long, 
gray shape shot by with the swiftness of a torpedo, 
and the Javanese disappeared under water with a 
scream of mortal terror. They all stared, aghast, at 
the reddish swirl of eddying sea that closed over him. 

No one spoke for a time. George turned away, 
shaken and sickened. Then his father stepped forward 
and roared out an order in Malay. It brought the 
other seaman and the cook tumbling on deck, while the 
steersman paid off the main sheet and the proa hung 
idly waiting, with flapping mat sail. Captain Jack 
harangued them for some time. His tones were force- 
ful, commanding, decisive, George noted, and he could 
see submission coming into their untamed, fierce eyes. 
At length the oldest amongst them agreed to some- 
thing in guttural tones, and shouted to the steersman 
aft, who put the proa about and headed across the sea 
for Amboina. 

The Captain turned and mopped his brow. 


24 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

“Well, son — that’ll be about all, I guess. Cheer up, 
man, you look sick !” 

“Oh, it was horrible, that shark business, father!” 
groaned the lad. 

“I know it was horrible,” said his father, seriously. 
“There are plenty of horrible things a sailorman strikes 
in these seas, you know. And,” he added, putting his 
hand on the boy’s shoulder, “I came near losing you 
that time, son. Some day you’ll realize how much you 
mean to those that love you. If he hadn’t tripped he 
might have krissed you. And that would have been 
more than horrible — to me.” 

“Well,” said the boy thoughtfully, “it was a case 
of his life or mine, I suppose. Just the same, I’m 
mighty thankful that it wasn’t I that knocked him 
overboard.” 

“Sure! That’s the right way to feel, even about 
these here Javanese. Things are coming our way now, 
son. I’ve told them that this matter will have to be 
reported to the Governor at Amboina, and they have 
agreed to let me sail her over, paying them for the 
time. That was some punch you handed him, though, 
son!” he exclaimed, looking at George’s lean, sinewy 
young frame admiringly. “J'hey say that a single 
salvo of fourteen-inch guns can change the history of 
the world — well, one good paste from that mitt of 
yours has sure changed ours !” 


CHAPTER II 


“pearl atoll” 

“She’s makin’ weather to the east’rd, George,” rum- 
bled Captain Sloan, scanning the thunder-heads drift- 
ing over from the stormy New Guinea coast with an 
uneasy eye. 

“Huh! We’ll get a good chance to try the Malay 
way of shortening sail on these proas, eh?” retorted 
George, eager anticipation shining in his merry blue 
eyes. Since they had put the proa about for Amboina, 
the youth had been itching to try that stunt! They 
were now a day’s sail west of Ke’. Captain Sloan had 
decided to make Ceram by way of the Matabello 
Islands and the chain of islets that reaches the main- 
land from there. Navigating the proa, however, made 
him feel like a cat in a strange garret, for the craft 
was entirely novel to him; the safest way seemed to 
be to cross from Ke’, following the chain of small 
atolls to Ceram. 

“Mebbe, son ; I hope we wont have to shorten sail. 
What this crate’ll do in a blow neither you nor I know. 
The only wide passage is between Boon and Teor, 


25 


26 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


where we’ve got a gap of about twenty-five miles clear 
sea-way. We ought to pick up Teor this afternoon, on 
this course. It’s a palm island, but there are about a 
million little cocoa-palm atolls around it, so we gotta 
keep a bright lookout. Hosts of Pharaoh, a man’ll 
drift out of course like a length of bamboo in these 
currents !” 

George went forward, for his father trusted him 
best as lookout. Astern of him the whole proa dipped 
and rose on the smooth swells of the Banda Sea, her 
two mat lugger sails, bellying from the yards, hung at 
the heads of her tripod masts. Over to the east, a 
thick gray mist, topped with thunder-heads and split 
with vivid sheet lightning, told of a tropical thunder- 
storm bearing over from New Guinea. It would be 
upon them in about an hour, the boy reckoned, and he 
planned out just what they would do. When the squall 
hit them, he and one of the Javanese sailors would 
dash for the prop pole of the forward mast and lift 
it from its socket, letting the two yoke poles come 
swinging down about the long iron-wood pin which 
fastened them to the gunwales — those same poles in 
the base of one of which the Javanese captain had 
hidden their pearls. Meanwhile, his father would be 
doing the same with the mainmast, and both yards 
would come tumbling down. 

As he watched, it fell a flat calm. That squall 
cloud was sucking to itself all the wind. What there 


“PEARL ATOLL’ 


27 


was came puffy and variable, but he could see that his 
father did not want to abandon the proa to the cur- 
rents until the last moment, for he still kept sail on her. 
The horizon seemed to creep nearer; the squall cloud 
could not be seven miles away now, and its long, black, 
cigar shape with a ragged, wind-torn lower fringe, lay 
across the whole eastern horizon. There was a distant 
mutter of thunder. Anxiously George’s eyes scanned 
all around the horizon, for if there was land bearing 
anywhere he wanted to sight it before this thing shut 
them in. 

“Land ho, dad !” he shouted, perhaps a quarter of an 
hour later, for his keen eyes had detected the tiny black 
dots of palm tops just jutting above the glassy horizon 
to the west. “There’s TJeor, bearing north-nor’west.” 

“Good !” hailed the Captain, “We’ll pass between it 
and Boon handsomely, if some current doesn’t get us. 
I’ll hold sail all I can.” 

They both watched the oncoming squall, while the 
jurumuddi steered their course, praying volubly. The 
two Javanese sailors went aft and begged the Captain 
to let down the sail. They were badly frightened, and 
wanted to play safe — good and safe ! 

“No!” stamped Captain Sloan stubbornly. “We 
gotto get every fathom of westing we can — and then 
we won’t be any too safe! Sword of Jehoshaphat, men, 
what would ye? We can’t anchor in this hundred- 


28 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


fathom water! We’ll just drift at the mercy of the 
currents, once the sails are down !” 

A low moan came from over the horizon to the east. 
It swiftly developed into a subdued, snarling roar as 
of many waters gnashing. Overhead the great squall 
cloud rode high, its black edges ragged and angry. 
Behind it, a gloom as of night, rent with forked light- 
ning, filled the void. Then white foam, stretching 
in a long line from north to south, spread across the 
horizon. They could see it coming over the lead- 
colored sea. There was wind a-plenty there, even 
though their own waves were still smooth and oily! 

“All — hands — shorten sail!” yelled the Captain. 

George and the Javanese leaped like sprinters toward 
the foot of the tripod pole. With a heave that strained 
their backs they lifted the great prop from its socket 
and slid it aft along deck. The yoke above creaked 
and the gunwale pins groaned as the mast swung down. 
Captain Sloan had done the same by the mainmast, 
and both yards came down together like the folding up 
of a fan, while their prop poles trailed out astern into 
the sea. 

They were none too soon! While they were still 
disengaging themselves from the folds of the mat sails, 
the wind smote upon them with a fury awful and 
unending. There was fast and furious action for a 
few moments, for both yards were being whipped 
about across the waves and the sails bellied and threat- 


'PEARL ATOLL’ 


29 


ened to drive overboard. Captain Sloan made a flying 
leap for the leach of the mainsail and hung on with an 
iron grip. George could see his white teeth set as he 
held to the sail with every ounce of his strength, his 
toes hooking under the bamboo gunwale to keep him- 
self from being lifted bodily overboard. George him- 
self and his Javanese had got a rope around their 
sail and were fighting it savagely, getting a lashing 
around here, snubbing a rope around a pin there. The 
proa veered up into the wind, with both crews flinging 
themselves on the unruly mats — and then came the 
rain, in a white deluge, smothering everything and 
everybody in a choking, screaming, white fury. Thun- 
der went off like cannon crackers all around them; 
the play of lightning was vivid and incessant, but they 
scarce could give it a thought in the concentrated 
struggle to secure those sails. The palm mat was far 
harder to furl than canvas; unwieldy and stubborn, 
it took all of an hour to get the yards inboard and 
lashed in their places along the bamboo framework of 
the outriggers. 

Night had com® down with tropical suddenness 
before Captain Sloan could give a thought to where 
the proa might now be. 

“It’s a case of ears and eyes, son,” he warned George 
in a high-pitched shout across the wind. “Heaven 
knows where we’ve drifted to, but you can hear the 
roar of surf quite a distance even in this blow. Never 


3 o THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

let a single lightning flash go by without seeing all you 
can.” 

“Couldn’t we anchor, dad? Gee, it’s fierce, this 
drifting we know not where — what if we hit an atoll !” 

“May go right over one in these high seas!” yelled 
Captain Sloan through his cupped hands. “They often 
get inundated in a storm — they’re so low out of 
water!” 

Cheerful thought! George lay on the yards along 
the top of the thatch deck house and listened with all 
his ears. The dark horizon showed in a narrow circle 
of high, whitecapped seas, on which the proa rode like 
a gull, but his glimpses of anything at all were now few 
and far between, for the thunderstorm had gone on 
and its sheet lightning glared far to the west. Only 
the high wind and the angry sea remained as a 
reminder of the commotion it had caused. 

Captain Sloan barked out an order in Malay. In the 
dark, George saw him and the two Javanese hurrying 
forward to the anchor. It was a great, clumsy contrap- 
tion, the fork of a tree with a big stone lashed to it 
with rattan. They worked over it, getting it clear to 
go overboard, while the boy maintained his vigil. 
Pitch darkness set in. He could see nothing now. A 
pall, so intense that it seemed velvet blackness, envel- 
oped them, with the wind steadily going down. It 
was the intense darkness at the end of the storm, he 


'PEARL ATOLL’ 


knew, but it would be hours before the sea would calm 
down, too. 

He was listening, so that he could almost hear his 
heart beats, when off to port something loomed up 
even blacker than the blackness of inky night around 

them. No sound whatever of surf came to his tense 
ears, but a swishing noise and the lapping of small 
waves buffeting against something could be heard dis- 
tinctly. 

“Let go anchor — quick, dad!” he yelled. “We’re 
drifting on something to port! Overboard with her! 
White sticks — columns — no, it’s trees!” he screamed. 

The anchor splashed over, amid a whirl of oaths 
and grunts. The proa minded it not at all, but rode 
in on the huge swells, drifting in long sweeps, her 
anchor fetching up nowhere. Nearer and nearer 
loomed the black vagueness, and the swishing tops of 
palm trees loomed up overhead, close aboard — and 

then, with a crash of riven planks, the proa was upon 
them ! She stopped dead, butted and rammed herself 
on the stout trunks, grinding and tearing up her out- 
rigger and bamboo framework, while they all dodged 
the flying splinters. 

“She’s lost! Jump, lad, quick, for the nearest tree !” 
shouted Captain Sloan, as the proa swept down side- 
wise against a great smooth bole. George felt him- 
self catapulted at it as the proa struck, and he flung 
his arms around the trunk and began to climb, while 


32 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the boat fell away below him on the surge. He shin- 
nied swiftly up into the top, the boom and smash of 
the boat butting herself to pieces among the trunks 
coming to his ears like a funeral knell. 

“Father! Father!” he called. “Are you safe!” 

“Here son!” called a deep, reassuring voice out 
of the night. “Got one of the crew up with me. We’re 
on an inundated atoll, I take it. No hope for the 
proa. Stay where you are until morning.” 

A voice cried out from another tree, off somewhere 
in the dark. They recognized it as the Bugis cook, 
gibbering Mohammedan prayers. Dull thuds came 
from below among the waters, where the logs of the 
proa were floating about. 

“We’ll pick up what’s left in the morning!” called 
the Captain cheerfully. “And then we’ll know where 
we are. Think hearty, son! Cheerily-O! We’re still 
alive!” 

They waited, hour after hour, for dawn. The 
noises of the sea below gradually died down, and then 
came ticking and running sounds as of dry land re- 
appearing when the tide goes out. Dawn came at last. 
A curious sight! Out to the horizon stretched the 
smooth, gray sea, calm as a grand mirror, without a 
sign of last night’s turmoil to remind them of the 
tremendous moods of the eternal ocean. Down below 
— fifty feet down — was drowned and scoured sand, 
with jungle plant leafage jutting up through it. A 


'PEARL ATOLL’ 


33 


tangled mass of cordage and spars of the proa fes- 
tooned around the trunks on the stout palm mats. 
Further on, a pair of proa planks, neatly split around 
the smooth column of a palm, hung like a pair of 
shears, tied together at their tops with the remnants 
of a rib. One of the outrigger’s lay jammed by its 
iron-wood gunwale beam between two close-growing 
sago palms. There was but little litter of wreckage; 
most of it had drifted into the lagoon of the atoll. 

“All hands — lay down!” called the Captain, jocu- 
larly, from his tree. It would be mighty tough luck 
that could break old Captain Jack’s spirit! thought 
George, as he sang out, “Aye, aye, sir !” and unbuckled 
his belt so as to make a safe descent. 

He made a loop of it around the palm and let him- 
self down backward, moving the belt notch by notch 
as it passed the scars of former leaf stems, which also 
formed tolerable steps for his feet. Captain Sloan and 
the Javanese sailor had meanwhile descended, and 
presently they were joined by the cook, his sacred 
green turban — signifying he had been to Mecca — much 
in disarray. 

It was interesting to watch the four survivors on 
this lonely atoll, George thought, each man following 
his own primitive instincts ; for, now that they had no 
ship, all semblance of command and discipline seemed 
to have gone with her. The cook laid an eye on the 
sago palm tree, judging its age with a critical glance; 


34 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

and up it he swarmed, with his knife dangling by a 
lanyard across his chest, intent on getting the material 
for sago bread. 

The Javanese sailor walked about, inspecting the 
remains of the proa and shaking his head solemnly, 
as if wondering by what miracle it could be ever 
brought together again. George and his father went 
across the belt of palms to the shore of the lagoon, to 
get some idea of the size of the atoll and the location 
of what wreckage might be left. 

“The first thing for us to find, son, is my sea chest,” 
rumbled Captain Sloan. “With the sextant, and our 
book of log-tables we can get some idea where we are, 
so we can figger where to go next.” 

“It was in the little rattan house on deck, father. 
I suppose that went adrift like a basket as soon as we 
were swept in among the palms. I didn’t see any signs 
of it on this side of the atoll, did you?” 

“Nary a sign, son. Still, that chest was pretty 
heavy — both our cutlasses, the sex., some books, and 
our spare ammunition are in it. It’s my guess it 
either drifted across the lagoon or sank before it ever 
got to t’other side ” 

“Or went clear on out to sea, perhaps,” finished 
George for him. “This lagoon’s sure a little feller; 
it isn’t three hundred yards wide.” 

“New atoll; it probably gets inundated every big 
storm. But the- next tide will leave us land enough, 


“PEARL ATOLL” 35 

so we won’t have to take to the trees. We’ll start 
exploring the hull business right now, son.” 

George felt mighty hollow and empty about the 
bread-basket, but it wouldn’t take an hour to go around 
the whole ring of the atoll. Besides, they might come 
upon a tin of coffee or some of the proa’s food stores. 
He did not relish an exclusive diet of cocoanuts and 
sago bread. They walked back to where the Javanese 
and the cook had established a sort of camp amid the 
proa wreckage. Her fire-pot brazier had gone over- 
board and sunk like a stone at the first strike, and, 
rallying around it as a camp, the cook had set up a 
kitchen, with quantities of sago pith ready to be pulped. 

The Javanese was setting about fire making. He 
had shaved a log of the proa wood until he had got 
down to bone-dry fiber. In one end he had split a cleft 
and wedged it open with a pebble. As they watched, 
he slipped a length of rattan cord through the cleft, 
and, putting the log on the sand with his foot on it, 
sawed vigorously through the cleft with the cord of 
rattan. Clouds of dense smoke rose immediately. 
By the time the rattan parted in two with the friction, 
there was a live coal in the dust in the cleft, which he 
fanned vigorously to a flame. 

“Can’t lose these Islanders at their own game!” 
laughed the Captain whimsically, as a fire was started 
in the brazier. He told the Javanese their plans. 

“Me stop. Prenty kai-kai (eats) soon!” grinned 


/ 


3 6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the sailor. “Fish, sago, cocoanut, when Cap-fellah 
come back!” 

“Good! Marster will go-long, look-see,” replied 
the Captain, answering in pidgin-English. 

They took a bearing on a clump of palms across the 
lagoon, which seemed in the track of wreckage drift 
from the proa, and set out around the horn of the 
lagoon. Great red and orange land-crabs scuttled to 
their holes among the roots as they walked ; herons and 
pelicans flew out of the mangroves and flapped across 
the lagoon; lizards flashed across their path. There 
was no sign of man whatever; the question of water 
would soon become pressing, the Captain noted, for 
this atoll was like any of hundreds like it, where land 
is gradually being built up out of the hundred-fathom 
sea by the coral polyps. It would be perhaps a cen- 
tury before the soil would be dense enough to hold 
any fresh water. 

Half an hour brought them to the clump of palms 
across the lagoon. Father and son began to quarter 
the ground, carefully. It was hard to believe that any 
drift of fragments of the proa had passed that way. 
Not a vestige remained. The odd, floating bits had no 
doubt worked their way, on the restless waves, through 
the palm trunks and gone on out to sea. Caught, 
however, on the spikes of a shaggy sago palm, the grid 
of one of the bamboo outrigger platforms finally 
rewarded them, as a sign that wreckage had gone by. 


“PEARL ATOLL” 37 

There was no sign of the ship's water butt, nor of the 
house on deck. 

“But, father,” stamped George stubbornly, “that 
house on deck can't have gotten through these trees 
without leaving something ! — I'll bet anything that it’s 
somewhere in the lagoon. I'm going to swim out 
there.” 

“Sharks’ll get you, son,” warned the Captain. “I’d 
rather you wouldn’t risk it.” 

“You get out as far as you can in the mangroves and 
stand guard with your automatic, and it’ll be all right 
— I’m not afraid!” said the boy earnestly, beginning 
to strip. 

Captain Sloan gave a reluctant consent. In a trice 
George was ready, and they pushed through the muddy 
belt of mangroves. The cool water felt good as he 
went overboard in a long fetch. He whooped and 
splashed, his heart singing with gladness, for this 
wild, vagabond, islander life was getting down to the 
eternal savage in his boy nature. 

“Yon she is, dad!” he yelled. “She stranded atop 
the mangroves, to your left, and sank down in them 
with the tide. I can see the top of the roof from here.” 

“Swim to it, George, while I cover you from here. 
There’s the fin of a shark, now, out in the lagoon. 
Hurry!” called the Captain. 

“I smell him!” laughed George, shooting for the 
house in a smashing overhand drive. The rank odor of 


38 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

watermelon came to his nostrils as he cleft his way 
through the still water. As he slid up on the thatch 
roof, the Captain’s automatic cracked, and the surge of 
a wave swept through the mangrove stems. He turned, 
to see the white belly and gaping red maw of a nine- 
teen-foot shark soaring by. 

“Hi!” laughed the boy, twiddling his bare toes at 
him disdainfully. “Nothing didding, old-timer!” 

The Cap’n came grunting through the mangroves; 
“I put a bullet through him, anyhow!” he wheezed. 
“Can you get inside the house ?” 

“Sure! Wait till I get busy with my clasp knife.” 
George pulled on the lanyard, and his heavy, sailor’s 
clasp knife, with its broad, blunt end, came up out of 
the depths of his white jacket. He cut a square hatch 
hole in the roof and peered down. 

“Everything’s here, dad!” he sang out cheerily. 
“There’s the chest, and our mess kit and bedding. 
Stand by, while I dive for ’em.” 

He slipped down inside, and, standing on the bam- 
boo grid floor of the house, passed out all their belong- 
ings. They got them across the mangroves and spread 
them out on the sand under the palms. 

“Gee ! I’m thirsty already, dad !” exclaimed George. 
“Shall I swarm up a tree and throw down some nuts?” 

“Wait! There’s a little water in my canteen,” said 
the Cap’n, shaking it. “Enough for you and me. 
Lord love you, child, but I despise cocoanut water!” 


'PEARL ATOLL” 


39 


They divided the canteen and then opened the chest. 
It had shipped a good deal of water, so the Cap’n 
busied himself in carefully opening the wet pages of 
his Almanac and his copy of the “South Seas Mari- 
ner’s Record,” so that the sun could dry them out. 
The chest held two cutlasses, spare ammunition for 
the automatics, the sextant, a boat compass, fishing 
tackle, and a spare suit of clothes for the Cap’n, all 
waterlogged. The Cap’n pulled his chronometer out 
of his vest fob by its leather lanyard. 

“Near noon, now, son. We’ll take a latitude sight, 
now. You hold the watch and give me noon.” 

George dried off the sextant and took a couple of 
preliminary sights. “Ready, father — stop!” he called 
as the second hand crept around to noon. They read 
the vernier. 

“30° 25' 15" South,” rumbled the Cap’n, subtract- 
ing it from 90°. “Declination on January 26th, which 
is to-day, about 25 degrees. Look it up in the tables, 
son, but be careful with that wet paper.” 

George read out the declination and they subtracted 
it from the reading. 

“That leaves 5 0 1' 32" South of the equator, boy,” 
declared the Cap’n, marking the figures in the sand 
with a small stick. “That puts us on the Ke’ side. 
We must be on one of those little atolls between Boon 
and Ke’. Must have drifted south out of our course 
quite a bit.” 


40 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

“KeM” ejaculated the boy savagely. “Can’t we 
ever get away from that place!” 

“Better’n nowhere, son!” retorted the Cap’n philo- 
sophically. “We’ll build a raft out of the two out- 
riggers, and rig a sail from what’s left over from the 
proa mats, then navigate along these islets until we 
reach Ke’. It’s the home of the greatest boat-builders 
in the Archipelago ; mought be we can get some one to 
sail us over to Amboina from there.” 

The boy’s face brightened. “Build a raft! Gee, 
what a lark ! Come on — le’s go ! I’m keen for that, 
dad! And, right now, I’m hungry enough to eat a 
shark!” 

They repacked the chest, hung the cutlasses on their 
belts, and draped their partly-dried blankets over their 
shoulders. Each taking a handle of the chest, they set 
out around the horn of the lagoon again, planning on 
the making of the raft, as they walked. 

Arrived at camp, they found the Javanese had 
caught a mess of fish in the lagoon and the cook was 
already baking sago bread on a flat stone. He had 
driven in flat planks from the proa deck in the sand 
around the fire^ and on each was pinned a steak of 
fish, browning and sizzling deliciously in the heat of 
the beach fire. George yawned cavemously and fell 
on his portion with devouring jaws the minute the 
sago bread was ready to break. Washed down with 
cocoanut water, it made a satisfying meal. 


'PEARL ATOLL’ 


4i 


“Now, then, men,” said the Captain, in Malay, 
when the meal was finished, “we’re going to make a 
raft out of the outriggers and get away from here, right 
sudden! Turn to!” 

“Going, sar!” grinned the sailor, and they tackled 
the work with a will. 

The outriggers were long, hollow trunks of bamboo 
that would float like corks, and the one jammed in 
the tree had its broken lengths of outrigger beams 
lashed to it. The other the Javanese had found in 
the mangroves, where its heavy iron-wood beam had 
stuck down and caught in the bushes, anchoring it. 
Hauling them to the lagoon beach, they laid them side 
by side and lashed the beams across. On them went 
three of the proa deck planks for a platform, and, 
with this as a mast step, the Cap’n and George rigged 
a lateen sail out of the spars and mats of the proa. 
By evening the raft was ready for a trial cruise. She 
proved fairly able, and, with a paddle split out of a 
plank and whittled roughly into shape, she steered and 
tacked “without makin’ much more leeway than head- 
way!” as Captain Sloan put it. 

Next morning they put aboard a store of cocoanuts, 
filled the canteens with water from more of them, and 
made up a pack of sago bread and cooked fish. By 
noon they were ready to sail. The Cap’n motioned for 
the Javanese and the cook to hop aboard. 

To his utter astonishment they hung back, giggling 


42 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

and digging in the sand with their toes like a pair 
of embarrassed children. 

“What’s the matter with ye — all aboard, men! We 
gotto get movin’ !” ordered the Cap’ll testily. 

The Javanese tittered and hung back, sheepishly: 
“Me stop. Prenty eats; prenty nuts; black-boy he 
come, some day,” he objected. 

“What! You going to stay here, marooned for 
the Lord knows how long!” barked the Cap’n incredu- 
lously. “Hop aboard, man!” 

The Javanese shook his head. “We-fellahs stop. 
Shark, him kai-kai you-marster, if litty wind he come. 
Boat, him no good.” 

No amount of argument could move them. The 
islanders preferred to stay where they were until a 
canoe should come that way and take them off. The 
Cap’n knew enough of their nature not to urge them 
further. This life suited them! 

“Wal’r — good luck to ye!” he grunted at length. 
“Shove off, boys !” The raft sail filled and she gath- 
ered headway, leaving the Javanese waving farewells 
on the shore. The Cap’n and George headed out 
through the gate of the lagoon to the open sea, and then 
set a course for Ke’ by their boat compass. 

“It’s about seventy miles from here to the anchorage 
at Kar, son. We’re doin’ mebbe four knots. Ought 
to reach there in two days if no storm comes up,” 
averred the Cap’n as George trimmed home the sheet. 


PEARL ATOLL” 


43 


Slowly the atoll sank down into the sea astern, but 
before they had lost sight of it, the palm tops of 
another loomed up over the horizon ahead. There was 
a whole chain of these atolls, mere specks on the chart, 
between them and Ke\ The raft slid and wallowed 
on the long swells, but she bowled along, slow but 
sure. The Cap’n sniffed the salt air as he steered. 

“I smell shark, son! — there he is, now. We ought 
to collect nearly every one in the Banda Sea before we 
get through,” he laughed. He pointed over to where 
a great triangular fin jutted out of a wave slope. The 
big fellow was paralleling their course. Presently 
there was a moist, slimy cough in the sea and another 
one rose, just astern, turned over on his white belly 
and gaped his jaws open as he sheared by. 

“Wouldn’t you like us! Just wouldn’t you!” 
taunted George from his safe roost on the sea chest. 
“We’ll have a ring of them around us soon, dad!” 
He drew his automatic and plunked at the one passing 
to starboard. The monster gave a flip of his tail and 
dived, the shower of water from his great propellor 
splashing all over them. 

“Don’t waste ammunition on them, George,” warned 
Cap’n Jack. “We’re all right, — unless a choppy blow 
comes on. They may rush us if the seas go over the 
raft, and then we’ll want all the ammunition we’ve 
got.” 

He held course, and the raft drove steadily on, rising 


44 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the atoll ahead, while the ring of sharks that had now 
gathered played and wallowed in circles about them. 
By evening they had sailed around the coast of the 
atoll, entered its lagoon, and run ashore in the man- 
groves. 

“Some mariners we are, dad!” crowed George as 
they stepped ashore. “Here’s fresh water — at last!” 

“Where? I don’t see any water!” growled the 
Cap’n. “This atoll’s considerable larger than the 
other, but she won’t have a drop of it on her, and you 
can lay to that, son!” 

“Yes, there is — look at these thorn trees, father!” 
cried George cheerfully. The undergrowth of the 
palms here consisted of thickets of dense thorns and 
tough, gnarly iron-wood. “Air plants, father, see ’m !” 

The boy pointed into the dense snarls of brier and 
small branches that filled the thorns. In them grew 
green air-plants, their curved leaves branching out like 
a pineapple. George swarmed up and tilted the first 
one over his hat. Out of the bases of the leaves 
trickled nearly a cupful of rain water, and made a 
little pool in the bottom of his hat. He passed it down. 

“Drink, father — drink hearty ! There’s lots of 
them. We’ll fill both canteens.” 

The old man licked his lips and wiped his mus- 
tache. “Gosh, son, that’s the sweetest drink in the 
world — how I despise that cocoanut water!” 

He set about making a fire, while George climbed 


“PEARL ATOLL” 


45 


valiantly among the thorns, robbing the air-plants of 
their store. By the time the fish was hot, he had filled 
both canteens. They ate hearty and then turned in on 
a bed of dry leaves, raked up from under the thorn 
thickets. 

At dawn they were under way again and sailing out 
of the atoll, gliding along before the steady monsoon. 
Their friends, the sharks, picked them up out in the 
open sea again, following the raft as is their custom. 
Two big ones in particular became insolently bold, 
rubbing aganist the trunks of the bamboo and eyeing 
them bale fully as they turned over to sweep by. 

“Jerusha’s Cats!” exclaimed the Cap’n scornfully. 
“If them critters had any sense, they’d just sheer 
under us and capsize us, like a whale would. It’s sure 
a wise provision of Nature that they can’t reason none ! 
Well, we ought to raise Ke’ out of the sea to-day. Le’s 
take a time-sight an’ git our longitude.” 

They took the sun’s bearing by compass when it 
bore dead east, and read the hour angle with the sex- 
tant. Comparing this with the Captain’s little chro- 
nometer and working out the tables, they figured 
Long. 132 0 45' 20" East, doing the sum on the proa 
plank deck. 

“Goin’ strong, son! We make Ke’ to-night if the 
wind holds !” 

“It’s doing more than that, it’s freshening,” said 


46 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

George. “There’s a storm off to the north, somewhere. 
Haven’t you noticed the swells getting larger?” 

“Yep, but she’ll ride it — never worry! We ought 
to run into some fishing canoes out from Ke’ pretty 
soon, anyway,” retorted the Cap’n. “Go it, old girl!” 

The raft dipped and soared as the catspaws came 
thicker and harder, and her speed crept up to a trium- 
phant six knots. They passed two atolls to starboard 
without making for either of them, and then, out of a 
cloudbank to the east, there gradually developed the 
dim white outlines of the high mountains of Ke’. 

“Land ho!” hailed the Cap’n, bluffly, his practised 
eyes seeing it first. “Dead ahead! Can you make it 
out, son?” 

“Looks just like a picture coming out on a photo- 
graphic plate !” cried George. “Gee, only a little while 
ago we were crazy to get away from there — Stand 
by!” 

His warning shout was caused by the break of a 
whitecap which snarled down the slope of a wave and 
rolled right over the raft, wetting down everything. 
She drove through it like a fish. Unsinkable, it would 
be wet going; but they would reach Ke’ — sure as 
fate! 

“Man that bamboo pole, George!” ordered the Cap’n. 
“I don’t mind a bit of sea boarding us, but we’re in 
for a time now with them sharks!” 

The raft surged down into a hollow and the wave 


PEARL ATOLL’ 


47 


crests shut them in. She labored up the slope, to jam 
into the smother of whitecap that curled over and 
sent its water swirling around their feet. 

“Look out! — Stand by!” yelled the Cap’n. 

Out of the wave slope jutted the long, gray snout 
of a shark! He rammed them close aboard and his 
mouth snapped shut as it slewed across their platform. 
The Cap’n dodged, while George jabbed at him with 
the bamboo pole. Then the Cap’n fired his pistol and 
the big gray fellow shot on ahead and sounded, his tail 
smashing spray into their faces. 

“They’re getting bold, boy — fire whenever you see 
one!” said the Cap’n, gritting his teeth grimly. He 
leveled his pistol and drove a shot into the white 
belly of another, soaring by to port. George fired 
at him the same moment, and a smudge of dark red 
discolored the blue sea. For a moment the shark hung, 
belly up, seemingly stunned, while George cheered and 
yelled with delight. The raft swept on, leaving him 
astern. Then there was a commotion in the sea, as two 
of the monsters attacked their wounded comrade. 
They bit and tore at him ; more joined in, and, reced- 
ing rapidly in their wake, a bloody sea orgy ensued. 

“If we can do that , every time, we’ll hold them at 
bay like a pack of wolves till Kingdom Come!” barked 
the Cap’n. “Three more hours will land us at Kar, 
at this rate.” 

For a time they were fully occupied in navigating 


48 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the raft. She could not tack, because the force of the 
wind put the lee bamboo trunk far under water, 
making a fine slope up which a shark could slide with 
ease ; but she could drive dead before the wind, and it 
lifted her along in great swoops that would have been 
grand riding were it not for the sinister menace that 
swam back there in their wake. George stood on the 
platform, pole in hand, watching the waves anxiously. 

“Here they come — two this time — Shoot, dad !” 

The Cap’n whirled around and fired, putting down 
the nearest. Its mate sounded instantly and there was 
a tense moment when father and soon looked at each 
other, wondering when and where it would come up 
next. 

“Boarding! — to starboard!” bawled the Cap’n, firing 
point blank as fast as he could pull trigger. 

George caught one glimpse of two malignant green 
eyes glaring at him out of the sea, and then a gaping 
red maw, lined with double rows of saw teeth, opened 
upon him. He jabbed the pole deep into the shark’s 
mouth as its head swept across the platform. Its jaws 
closed and the bamboo crackled like paper. The whip 
of it yanked the pole out of his hands and hurled the 
youth sprawling upon the planks. He would have 
gone overboard, had not the Cap’n grabbed his collar 
in a burly fist. 

“Avast, there — bully boy! You done fine, son! 


PEARL ATOLL’ 


49 

You gave him more of that pole than he bargained for, 
you did ! He’s gone.” 

George scrambled to his feet. The shark was 
thrashing about furiously astern, striving to get the 
pole out of his mouth. Red splotches marked the sea- 
foam, where the Cap’n’s bullets bled. He was done 
for, like a harpooned whale, and they looked back, to 
see him the target of two of his bloodthirsty mates, 
who were devouring him piecemeal. 

“But — next time, father?” George was shaking all 
over. It seemed to him that this game could not keep 
up ! Without a fending pole 

“There ain’t goin’ to be any next time, boy. Look 
yonder, off our starboard bow!” grinned the Cap’n. 
“Canoe ahoy ! See ’em cornin’ ?” 

Two long black canoes loomed up ahead. Their 
bows rose high on the swells, to crash down, sending 
white plumes of spray twenty feet up from each side 
of their bows. An immense figurehead, decorated with 
cassowary hair and cowrie shells, rode high above the 
sharp prows. At least twenty paddles in each one 
drove them on, and a deep singing chant came to their 
ears across the windswept waters. 

“Ke’ Islanders. Papuan niggers, they are, but 
harmless — great boat-builders, I’ve always heard,” 
declared the Cap’n. 

“How about your bag of pearls, dad?” queried 


50 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

George, anxiously, and there was much misgiving in 
his tones. 

The Cap’n winked. “George, did you ever see your 
old pappy takin’ any ondue chances with our hard- 
won fortune? I’d trust none of these natives, son. 
Here we are, two white men against forty blackbirds. 
They may strip us of everything we have; an’ again, 
they may not. You can’t tell. When we set out from 
the atoll I figgered on something just like this ” 

“Where are the pearls, then, dad? They’ll find ’em, 
sure!” groaned George, unable to restrain his impa- 
tience any longer. 

“No, they won’t! They’re up in that cocoanut tree 
on the atoll, son!” laughed the Cap’n, slapping his knee 
hilariously. “An’ there they’ll stay, until we’re fixed 
to go for ’em in a legitimate manner — that is, in com- 
mand of our own ship and with people we can trust. 
Savvy?” 

George laughed outright. “Up in your cocoanut 
tree!” he cackled. The thought of the Javanese sailor 
and the cook marooned within fifty feet of vast wealth, 
tickled his soul. Sure, his father was a canny old 
scout! He had wondered why the Cap’n had slept so 
soundly near those two natives while on the atoll, for 
both of them knew all about the pearls and how their 
own Javanese captain had lost his life trying to steal 
them. Now he knew! 

“Great stuff, father! I suppose you marked the tree 


“PEARL ATOLL” 51 

somehow. Gee, that atoll will get named in the 
Mariner’s Record as Tearl Atoll,’ I’m thinkin’!” 

“Sure! We’ve got a good bank, there, until some 
of this Crusoe business is over with. I’ve got forty 
dollars in gold, and that ought to get us a passage to 
Amboina. Then I know a schooner captain or two 
who will sail us over to Boon — * — Hist ! The niggers 
are signaling us!” 

The foremost canoe had stopped paddling and her 
crew were yelling and gesticulating at them. The 
Captain stood up and roared something at them in 
Malay. They dipped their paddles furiously, throw- 
ing up showers of spray and singing as they came. 
They were just in time, for a large fin cut the water 
to port and its owner circled, preparatory to rushing 
the raft. The Sloans fired at it, rapidly, and then the 
canoe swept down and the shark dived, frightened 
down by the splash of many paddles. 

A row of mop-haired, grinning savages chattered at 
them in a Papuan dialect, while the Captain shouted 
back his wants in Malay, and then tried beche de mer, 
seeing that they did not understand him. An old 
sinner, with nothing on him but a string around his 
middle, finally answered in a wonderful beche de mer . 

“Me-fellah, Oku! Orang-kaya! (chief)” he intro- 
duced himself. “Captain-fellah, him stop long Ke’ ?” 

“Sure ! Me plenty buy’m proa,” averred the Captain. 


52 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


“Black-boy him take marster in canoe? Raft, him 
plenty small, too much. No good!” 

They veered alongside, and the sea chest was lifted 
aboard. Then abandoning the raft to its fate, the 
canoe swung around and headed for the tall headlands 
of Ke\ 


CHAPTER III 


BEACHED ON KE* 

The two long black native canoes swept rhythmically 
landward, while the towering mountains of Ke’ rose 
out of the sea, shrouded in mists, high over their heads. 
Captain John Sloan and George, his son, sat together 
on a wide rear thwart, watching the landfall curiously. 

“Hosts of Pharaoh, son, but we’ve been through a 
lot since we sighted her on that Javanese proa, eh?” 
rumbled the old Cap’n, voicing George’s unspoken 
thoughts. 

“You bet!” replied his son, his blue eyes twinkling 
with reminiscences. “The big question now is, how 
are we ever going to get away from here? Have you 
sounded Oku about a passage to Amboina ?” 

“Yep. He’s heard of the place, and that’s about all. 
Tjiese niggers are boat-builders, but they never navi- 
gate further than over to Aru, and there’s no use 
going there. We couldn’t buy a steamer passage with 
my forty dollars ; besides, a steamer don’t touch there 
but once in a dog’s age. Looks like we’d have to buy 
a proa and sail her over ourselves.” 

53 


54 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

George watched the line of mop-haired black pad- 
dlers swinging to their stroke, as he thought over their 
chances. Old Oku, their chief, sat astern of them, his 
wrinkled face scanning the channel through the coral 
reefs as he guided the steering paddle. The Re’ 
Islanders were a happy lot, chanting in occasional 
spontaneous bursts of song as they paddled, and 
entirely contented with their lot. Their grand for- 
ests gave them plenty of timber, and every native 
captain in the Archipelago came here to buy boats of 
them. To leave their home for a long three-hundred- 
mile voyage to Amboina across the Banda Sea would 
be farthest from their ideas, George felt, putting him- 
self in their place. It would be hard to ship even one 
man for a crew, he realized. Still, with a small proa 
that two could manage, they might get across alone if 
no storm or squall came upon them. But, then, the 
currents, and the chain of islets reaching from Ceram 
nearly to Ke’ — how could they manage to sail through 
them without being wrecked on some little atoll like 
the one they had just escaped from? 

He gave it up, leaving their troubles to his father, 
the Captain, and contented himself with curiously sur- 
veying their wild, strange surroundings. The canoe 
that they were in delighted him. It was built of three 
whole tree trunks, hollowed out to make a keel and 
two curving sides. It was perhaps forty feet long, 
with thwarts every six feet, and the planks were 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


55 


doweled together along their edges and held in place 
by flexible iron-wood ribs lashed to inside projections 
on the planks, just as in the construction of the larger 
proas. The canoe’s stern was open to the sea, and a 
long steering oar ran out through it. A naked native 
was squatting on the oar, his legs tangled around it, 
and his back and sides filling the gap in the stern so 
that the following seas that curled up astern were 
stopped by his own body. Plenty of water was getting 
in, at that, but a wet boat meant nothing to these naked 
islanders ! 

The sun was setting as they ran in under the head- 
lands of Ke\ Light limestone cliffs rose abruptly 
from the shore, with screw pines (pandanus) border- 
ing their tops. A magnificent tropical forest clothed 
the high mountains stretching endlessly southward, 
and the beaches were of dazzling white sands, with 
cocoa palms bending and waving on the shore. The 
shelving bottom, under a crystal sea, shaded from 
emerald green to blue lapis-lazuli to deepest ultra- 
marine. For forty feet down they could see the coral 
growth studding the bottom, over which the canoe 
glided like a ship on a mirror. 

Captain Sloan grunted his thanks to Oku for their 
rescue from the raft, and they stepped ashore among 
the crowd of natives that had come down to the land- 
ing. The crew busied themselves pitching fish ashore, 
seized with howls of delight by the women and children 


5 6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BAXDA SEA 

whenever they conld tear ff i riiMeJirs mj fnca 
staring at the strange clothing of the two wife* re. 
George and his father left the crowd and fiofewed 
their sea chest, carried on the bread shcxrders cf an 
obliging native, to a line of low sheds which fringed 
the beach. Behind it were the thatch huts of the vil- 
lage of Kar, nestling in a grove of palm trees. 

Under the sheds were proas in all stages of ccrt- 
struction, the mop-haired Islanders using no other tooh 
than axes, adzes and augers, yet producing as he fits 
as ever went into a plank at Gloucester — as even the 
Sloans had to admit. The long curved planks were 
hewn out of the solid log, shaped to fit the future boat. 
At intervals a raised lug was left along the inside of 
each plank, and, so shaped, gangs of husky young 
natives were dragging them in out of the forest. The 
edges of these planks were hewn to a hair-line fit and 
fastened together by hard-wood dowel pins, like the 
leaves of a table. Then pliant ribs were sprung into 
place under the projections and lashed to them with 
rattan, and the deck beams were driven into shallow 
notches cut in the uppermost plank. Finally, the out- 
rigger beams, curved downward like huge bows, were 
lashed into notches cut in the gunwales, and the out- 
riggers of big hollow trunks of bamboo were secured 
at the outer ends with upstanding crotches of hard- 
wood lashed to beam and outrigger. Not an iron nail 
or plank went into the proa anywhere ; the whole boat 


acnk if 


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ciajf r^rr xr inr iscxm 


58 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

“Where you get him earring, Oku?” he asked, 
breaking into the conversation. 

The old native grinned. 

“Me have’m long, long time. My father, my old 
father (grandfather), him have’m. Kai-kai (eat) 
prenty white man, long, long time ’go.” 

Further questioning brought out that about twenty 
of these gold “ornaments” would buy the proa, 
although Oku was reluctant to sell at any such low 
price ! 

The Cap’n turned away in despair. 

“The dumed, ignorant cannibal!” he muttered to 
George. “He’s askin’ four hundred dollars in gold, 
when I could buy the hull proa with ten dollars’ wuth 
of gimcracks! This is all the money we have, son. 
Gosh, we’re sure beached in a heathen land ! Danged 
if we’ve got a single thing to trade !” 

They went back to where they had left the sea chest, 
and opened it. There was nothing worth trading 
inside. Cap’n Sloan’s brass sextant in its mahogany 
box, a boat compass, two cutlasses and the spare 
ammunition for the automatics, a copy of the “South 
Seas Mariner’s Record” and a nautical almanac, fish- 
ing tackle and some spare clothes, were all it contained. 
Valueless on Ke’! 

They were hungry and dejected. Penniless beach- 
combers, The Cap’n finally traded his clasp knife for 
some sago bread, yams, a fish and some pork, and they 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


59 

made their campfire out under the cocoa palms a little 
way along the beach. 

After they had eaten, they sat before the fire con- 
sidering what to do next. George got out the copy 
of the “Mariner’s Record,” reading it by the firelight 
to look up what notes had been made on Ke\ The 
very first item caught his eye and held it. 

“KE’; Jan., 1710. Portuguese galleon, Salvator 
Maria , D. Vaccarro master, driven ashore in Lat. 
7° 27' S. by typhoon. Crew eaten by cannibals. One 
boat, G. Viseppe, mate, reached Amboina in terrible 
straits after rowing three hundred miles. May, 1756, 
English bark, Mary Bunby ” 

“Stop!” interrupted the Cap’n. “Read that again, 
about that there Guinea galleon.” 

George read it over, slowly; and then they both sat 
and looked at one another, long and thoughtfully. 

“Do you think the wreck could still be there, 
father?” asked George at length, the light of adventure 
beginning to shine again in his eyes. 

“Mought — and again, mought not be,” ruminated 
the Cap’n. “After two hundred years, son! . . . 
Depends on how she struck. . . . Crew got ashore 
and were massacred, you say?” 

“No; eaten,” corrected George. “It tallies up with 
old Oku’s story, though, dad!” he exclaimed excitedly. 
“And those pieces of eight he wore for earrings ! Oh, 
let’s do it, father — please!” he begged. “Let’s go 


6o THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


down to Lat. y° 27' South — you can find it with your 
sextant — and see what we find !” 

“Mought as well — as stay here, ,, exclaimed the Cap’n 
at length. “Jerusha’s Cats, we’ll starve if we git to 
beach-combin’. I’m old, but I can still hike around in 
the jungle. We can shoot guinea fowl and wild pig, 
and I can fish, and we’ll make sago bread from the 
palms, and there’s plenty of wild bananas — it’s the 
thing to do, son !” 

“Hurray, dad l” yelled George delightedly. “Le’s 
go!” 

He sought a bed in the shavings under the boat shed 
that night, all excitement, and with a lighter heart than 
he had known since the wreck of their pearl schooner, 
the Kcrnani. To live in the wild jungle, care free, yet 
with a possibility of treasure-trove at the end of it, 
appealed to every adventurous drop of blood in him. 
Far better, this, than the hopeless lingering of the 
beach-comber, getting poorer and poorer, waiting for 
a chance ship that might never come ! 

Next morning at dawn they were up and had cached 
the sea chest out in the forest. Out of it they took 
only the sextant, cutlasses, automatics and fishing 
tackle. The Cap’n insisted on a trip to the boat-shed 
grindstone to sharpen his cutlass before starting, but 
George, with the indolence of youth, contented him- 
self with merely turning the wheel for him and not 


BEACHED ON KE* 


61 


taking the time to sharpen his own, so eager was he 
to be off. 

The whole island of Ke’ is mountainous, stretching 
for sixty miles north and south in ranges three to four 
thousand feet high. Bold promontories of lava rock 
edge its shores, indented with little bays of clean white 
sand. With plentiful groves of cocoa palms growing 
just above the white line of the beach, and wild pigs 
and guinea fowl in the jungle, no one need starve in 
that land of plenty! 

Lat. 7 0 27' South lay some thirty miles down the 
coast. They made it in three marches, skirting along 
above the limestone cliffs, keeping as closely as possible 
in sight of the sea. On the third day George shot a 
wild pig, and, down on the beach near the carcass, 
where there was a small spring, they built a little hut of 
palm leaves, thatched over a slanting sapling. This 
was to be headquarters for their search, for the sextant 
had told them they were near the latitude of the wreck. 

“Now for a noon sight, son!” said Cap’n Sloan, 
drawing out his chronometer, as twelve o’clock 
approached. He took the sextant out of its box and 
began making preliminary sights with it. 

“Give me noon, lad,” he ordered, as George stood 
by with the little chronometer in hand. “I wouldn’t 
trade that old timepiece for all the proas in Christen- 
dom! With it, an’ the sex. and our boat compass, 


62 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


we can manage to navigate over to Amboina, some 
time this century. ,, 

“Ready ! — Stop !" called George, as the little second- 
hand crept around to noon. The Cap’n shot the sun, 
subtracting the declination taken from a handy vest- 
pocket table book. 

“H’m — we're in Lat. y° 26' South boy," he mused, 
reading the vernier. “She ought to be in this little 
bight to the s’uth'd, or the next one — 'lowin’ for errors 
in them old wooden quadrants they used to have in 
them days. But let’s make camp, first; we got to fix 
up a sort of home, son, for we may be a long time 
lookin' for your wreck." 

They dressed George's pig, after Herculean efforts 
in hauling it out of the jungle. Then the Cap’n 
insisted on building a drying frame, to cure as much 
meat as possible before it could spoil. George, con- 
sumed with impatience, ran off to climb the nearest 
heights for a look-see, leaving the Cap'n making an 
improvised drying rack. 

The boy swarmed up the lava slopes with eager 
haste. The going was rough and severe in the extreme, 
for all the rocks were of porous, honeycombed lava 
that bit into shoe leather and tore his fingers as he 
climbed. He finally reached a high lookout rock com- 
manding the whole bay below him. 

Through the transparent waters he could see the 
bottom of the bay spread out like a map below him. 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


63 

It was dotted with dense patches of huge coral leaf, 
pearly and rosy in the sunlight. Sea urchins moved 
their spiny dots slowly over the clean white sand ; sea- 
weed in every hue of green filled the interstices 
between sunken lava bowlders. But there was no sign 
whatever of any wreck. Not a thing lay anywhere in 
the bottom of that bay that could possibly be construed 
as the work of ship-builders. 

Disappointed, he looked south. Maybe the old 
quadrant was accurate, then ; or perhaps the survivors 
had taken the latitude from the chart. The next head- 
land to the south was at least three miles further on ; 
the minute yet remaining from their observation 
would be more than covered by that distance. 
George hesitated yet a few moments more, before 
descending to camp. What had stopped him was the 
sinister vision of two large sharks, which swam lazily 
into the bay and sheered idly over the banks of coral 
and the leafy network of marine growth, in search of 
small fish. They swam out again, shooting along with 
the speed of submerged canoes, a single flip of their 
huge tails sending them forty feet through the water. 

“Gee !” muttered the boy, as he watched them appre- 
hensively, recalling the raft they had built on Pearl 
Atoll. “More sharks! If that wreck is still there, it 
must be in deep water, all grown over with coral ferns. 
We’ll have to build a raft; and then — say, — I’ve got 


64 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

to dive! Ugh! One of those big fellows'll come in, 
sure ! — and no one to help me, down there ! 

The thought made him nervous as he climbed down 
to camp. He knew from experience how bold and 
dangerous sharks were with a single swimmer. His 
imagination conned over a fight with one of those big- 
jawed demons, all alone, and he could see nothing at 
all cheerful about it. The pearl divers of Ceylon were 
safe enough from sharks; there were so many of the 
black boys that the commotion they made scared away 
any chance visitor. But, one boy, all alone ! Even if 
he got down to the wreck, what could he do, what 
could he find of any value in the brief sixty seconds of 
breath allowed him ? 

He came back to camp, subdued and discouraged, 
humbly glad to help his father with the curing. The 
old Cap’n was stubborn, and when he seized an idea 
he held to it through thick and thin. That idea, his 
principal idea, was food for them and plenty of it. 
They might not get a chance at another pig. How wise 
were the gray hairs of age ! 

The Cap’n had built a fine smoke house of palm 
leaves while he had been away, and in it hung great 
flitches of bacon, hams, and long strips of tenderloin. 
It would take at least two days of smoking to cure 
them, but it was worth it, for it gave them the priceless 
boon of independence. George, putting aside his 
impatience over the wreck, turned to, to help in col- 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


65 

lecting provisions. He made a rope of palm fiber, 
and with a loop of it around his waist, ascended the 
cocoa palms and threw down a store of nuts. Then 
he found a ripe sago palm growing in the little swamp 
behind their beach, and managed to cut out sufficient 
of the pith with his clasp knife to make a quantity of 
sago bread. This fibrous pith he first pounded and 
then soaked in water, the starchy jelly from it being 
dried over the fire in one of their mess tins. This he 
pounded to a flour and baked on flat stones. 

“Wal’r, George boy, — now I’m beginnin’ to feel like 
one of these here cannibal kings !” ejaculated Cap’n 
Jack, as they surveyed all their wealth of food on the 
third day. “But — no beach-combin’ for us! We 
mought’s well be a-lookin’ for the old Guinea boat.” 

“Oh, boy!” chirped George, strapping on his cut- 
lass. “Le’s go! S’pose we do find a lot of gold, 
father? It’ll be worth nothin’ here. Old pieces of 
eight are no good anywhere, now. Who’ll change 
’em?” 

“Gold is gold, son. It’s wuth sixteen dollars an 
ounce, no matter who stamps it. We can buy that little 
proa with twenty pieces, or we can stay on here till 
the proas come; show any captain enough gold, and 
he’ll take you anywhere — but, son, we ain’t found your 
wreck, yit !” 

“Do you really think there’ll be anything left of it — 


66 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


after two hundred years, dad ?” asked George, incredu- 
lously, as they walked along the beach. 

“ Tends on how she struck. They got off in the 
boats; that means a sand beach, not rocks. Ran her 
ashore in one of these bays, I’m figgerin’.” 

They had cached the provisions on a bamboo pole, 
to keep them clear of ants, and were carrying only 
two days’ rations, the sextant and their cutlasses and 
automatics. The march to the point to southward, 
skirting the shore, seemed more like ten miles than 
three. Every little indentation had to be scanned, and 
scanned from a height, to make sure before going on. 
They came at last to the point. It proved to be the 
end of a bold promontory jutting out to sea, and, turn- 
ing it, a long coast line spread out due west for twenty 
miles ! The noon sight showed that it was all in Lat. 
7° 27' South; for they were on the horn of the deep 
bight that crooks Ke’ from this point south! 

What a tiny, insignificant thing is a ship, compared 
to the vast landscapes of Nature! George felt a sink- 
ing sense of utter discouragement, as he viewed this 
- long stretch of coast with hopeless eyes. 

“Fat chance of finding anything here!” he groaned. 
“We’ll be days and days searching this !” 

The Cap’n, however, perked up. 

“Sword of Jehoshaphat, son! This looks like biz- 
ness !” he chortled, looking along the coast with spark- 
ling eyes. “This here’s jest the sort of landfall I’d 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


67 

have made, myself, if I’d been master of that Guinea 
packet! Typhoon druv them ashore, you say? Then 
the wind come from the east’ard. Skipper has, maybe, 
one close-reefed fores’l set, and runs along this coast 
lookin’ for a place to run her nose into, before he gits 
smashed ag’in them rocks to the west. What does he 
do ? Picks him the first place where the’s a leetle p’int 
of rocks juttin’ out, to get behind the lee of it afore he 
strikes. There’s a p’int, now! — see it, two miles on 
alongshore. That’s the place I’d pick !” 

He hurried along, George catching some of his 
enthusiasm, too. The coast here had a narrow, stony 
beach, with the mountains rising in abrupt slopes for 
two to three thousand feet, and covered with a dry 
jungle growth. The going was fairly easy, and in 
half an hour they had reached the point. Climbing 
high on the rocks, they looked carefully over its sandy 
bottom — but there was nothing there ! It was a little 
sheltered bay, though, an ideal refuge for a hard- 
driven ship. 

“I don’t jest figger this out,” fretted the Cap’n, 
scratching his gray locks. ‘‘Cornin’ in from the sea, 
ridin’ a typhoon, with mebbe pumps goin’ and the ship 
laborin’ — the skipper’d run for this place, sure! But 
there hain’t no wreck here, that’s certain !” 

George’s young eyes had been searching every foot 
of the shore after a careful examination of the bottom 


68 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


of the bay. ‘Wes — there was, father; look!” he cried, 
pointing with outstretched arm. 

The Cap’n followed it, until his eyes rested on some- 
thing white and rectangular in shape, half buried in 
the dry chapparal a short distance up the mountain side. 

“Wal’r — ’tain’t a rock; and ’tain’t a tree!” he 
declared, judgmatically. “Strike my pennants if it 
ain’t — say, it’s a — piece of — our wreck!” he groaned, 
bitter disappointment welling up in his tones. 

“Looks that way !” sighed George. “Some whopper 
of a south gale smashed her all up, long ago.” 

They hurried over and climbed up into the brush. 
Wedged firmly into a cleft in the lava bowlders, was a 
weather-scoured piece of a ship. Perhaps ten feet 
long by six wide, the splintered ends of oak ribs jutted 
out between thick ceiling and skin planks, bolted 
through with dozens of rusty iron drifts driven 
through ribs and planks. Carried high on the crest 
of some mighty comber, it had been hurled inland — all 
that was left of the Salvator Maria. 

They sat down, sick at heart. George wished that 
he could turn his face to the rocks and die. All his 
dreams of treasure-trove, of a triumphant home- 
coming, vanished in thin air at the silent testimony of 
this fragment of what was once a noble ship. He 
could see nothing before them but years of this 
Robinson Crusoe existence, beach-combers, or else to 
build another raft and try to get back to Pearl Atoll — 


BEACHED ON KE’ 69 

but then, where would they be ! It all seemed a more 
and more hopeless puzzle. 

“Wal’r, that’s that!” puffed the more philosophic 
Cap’n, dismissing their troubles with one huge sigh. 
“Don’t you worry, son,” he soothed, putting his arm 
tenderly about George’s shoulders. “ ’Tain’t so bad. 
We got lots to eat, an’ a roof over our heads. All we 
got to do is to exist, and eat hearty till the proas come 
back to Kar. Mebbe one of them captains will trade 
me my sextant for a trip to Macassar. Then I’ll get 
some captain I know to sail me to Pearl Atoll. We’re 
all right, son.” 

George shook him off, rebelliously. It all seemed 
too far in the future for him. He wanted things to 
happen now! He had inherited some of the Cap’n’s 
stubbornness, too, and he wanted this dream that he 
had lived on, taking for granted that there would be 
a wreck, to come true. Hope died hard within him; 
impatiently he spurned the thought of all those dreary 
months of inaction and uncertainty. Under the dull 
ache of disappointment his mind wore itself out, until, 
without moving again, he dozed off in the sun. The 
Cap’n set about getting something cooked, preferring 
to let the boy sleep off his reaction of despair. He 
would wake, full of new ideas and new resolutions, the 
old man knew. 

He was not disappointed. It was three hours later, 
and the tide in the little bay had gone out, leaving the 


70 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

sandy bottom wet and full of puddles when George 
woke again. He looked about, bewildered, and then, 
as his eyes lit on the fragment of the wreck, memory 
returned. 

“Huh! Just the same, father, we aren’t going to 
leave here without kicking around this bay to see what 
we can find!” he exclaimed brightly. “Gimme some 
of that pork — I’m famished!” 

Cap’n Sloan smiled cheerily as he handed him his 
portion of roast meat and sago bread. 

“No use lookin’, son; the niggers has found an’ 
carried off every last thing from that wreck, long ago. 
You can see all there is from here.” 

It looked so. The bottom of the bight contained 
patches of coral, huge pearl clams and horned whelks 
scattered about on the clean sand. Whatever there 
was of gold or ship’s stores had either been carried off 
or buried by the ceaseless action of the sea. 

“Well, it’ll ease my mind if I do some exploring, 
anyway,” laughed George, finishing off his meal in 
one huge bite. He ran down to the beach, leaving the 
Cap’n smoking and watching him quizzically. 

The boy wandered around on the sand awhile, kick- 
ing over coral clumps, digging here and there with an 
empty clam shell, splashing into shallow pools of clear 
sea water, but not an article of human workmanship 
rewarded him. A sense that the thing was foolish 
child’s-play gradually came over him — he might as well 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


7 1 


be searching the beaches of Bass Rocks of Gloucester 
at home, so far as finding anything of value was con- 
cerned. 

Farther and farther out he worked, coming at last 
to where the lazy surf washed over the outermost 
coral reefs. The marine growth was thick, here, and 
out of the coral jutted the edges of great pearl shells, 
partly open, exposing their lustrous white linings. 

He was skipping from one slippery clump to another, 
and peering down into the deep channels of sea-scoured 
sand, when a distant shout from the Cap’n arrested 
him. George stopped with his hand to his ear, reluc- 
tant to turn back. The Cap’n was repeating his warn- 
ing hail, when something whipped tight around his 
ankle ! He hopped with astonished fright, but his leg 
refused to budge. Looking down, he saw a mottled 
gray tentacle wound around his leg! A second one 
crept around a rock and fastened itself around his 
free leg, as the boy raised a howl of fear that brought 
the Cap’n to his feet with a jump. George whipped 
out his cutlass and hacked frantically at the taut cords, 
but its dull edge rebounded as from so much rubber 
hose. Furiously he struck again, with all his might, 
goaded to fierce resistance by the irresistible pull of 
those skinny arms which were threatening to pull him 
off his feet. 

A third tentacle wavered in the air before his face, 
and then whipped about his waist; and then, out of the 


72 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

depths from under a great bowlder, rose the round 
body of a giant devil-fish! The sea-foam parted 
around it, as the hideous face came to view, and more 
arms, dotted with suckers, darted toward him. George 
slashed at the enveloping tentacles in a frenzy of hor- 
ror. The octopus rose steadily into the air, grunting 
like a hog and snapping its horn beak at him viciously. 
This new development almost paralyzed the boy with 
fright. He had never dreamed that a devil-fish was 
amphibious, could fight out in the open air and make 
noises like some savage four-footed creature! Its 
great round eyes looked at him with eager, hungry 
greed boiling in their depths. He was drawn in so 
close, now, that he devoted all his attention to stabbing 
wildly at the throat of the monster, but his sword point 
was stopped by an invulnerable armor as hard as clam 
shell. 

Then the swift, bright flash of a cutlass sheared 
across his face, cutting three tentacles at once, while 
the Cap’n’s burly arm hummed through the air for 
a second stroke. George had never realized the mighty 
strength of that old father of his! The keen blade cut 
him free like shearing so much blubber, and then a 
swift stab of the Cap’n’s cutlass into the body of the 
octopus made him squeal like a wild pig. George, 
encouraged by the Cap’n’s shouts, collected his wits 
and tried to jam his cutlass hilt into the open beak of 
the creature, while at the same moment a mighty slash 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


73 


of his father’s cutlass gashed its body nearly in two, 
and the yellow entrails fell tumbling into the sea. 
The devil-fish groaned, sighed and fell to the rocks, its 
tentacles still hanging grimly to the boy’s ankles. Two 
resounding cuts severed them, and then the Cap’n 
grabbed George’s arm. 

“Did he hurt you! Did he bite you?” he roared, 
fiercely, scarce knowing what he was saying, and drag- 
ging the lad away from the writhing arms. 

“Guess he didn’t!” gasped the boy weakly. “It 
was all my fault, dad, for being too lazy to sharpen my 
cutlass — golly, but she was dull!” 

“My stars !” grunted Cap’n Sloan. “He’d jest bet- 
ter hadn't tetch ye! You’re all I’ve got in the world, 
sonny ! But this old arm’s knocked many a pert sailor- 
man spinning, an’ she’s still good, boy — she’s still 
good!” he chortled, gripping a forearm like a lean 
ham. 

“Good enough to save my life, father!” grinned 
George, admiringly. “I’m all right! — and — say — I’ve 
got a hunch !” His eyes sparkled. 

“What’s your hunch, sonny?” twinkled the Cap’n, 
looking at him fondly. “You ready to quit this fool- 
ishness and git back to camp?” 

“No, I ain’t!” declared George stoutly. “See that 
groove, down there in the sand, leading to where this 
old devil-fish hung out? It’s a regular sand-scour. 
S’pose something heavy got washed in there off the 


74 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

wreck? And s’pose this old bird’s been camping out 
here, over it, for cats knows how long? Eh?” 

“Well, no niggers’d look there, that’s sure ! They’re 
scairt to death of these here devil-fishes.” 

“Well, let us look, then!” 

George sank to his knees and peered down into the 
deep water under the huge bowlder. The welling tides 
of the surf scoured into and out of it ceaselessly, in 
invisible currents. 

“There’s something down there, father!” shouted 
George. “Look!” 

Cap’n Sloan sighed, whimsically, and got down on 
his knees, with many a grunt. 

“Dagged, if there ain’t! — a big clump of head coral, 
son — that’s all!” he grinned. 

“Yes, but what’s it growing on, that’s the point! 
I’m going to see!” Whipping off his clothes, George 
dived down into the pool with his cutlass. He rammed 
its point under the coral and pried with all his might. 
Coming up to breathe, he tried it again, and the mass 
of marine growth came loose. Under it was a long 
rectangular object, thickly studded with anenomes and 
huge barnacles. 

“That means wood, father!” cried George happily, 
coming up once more for air. “Barnacles’ll take to 
wood, every time !” 

Catching some of the boy’s enthusiasm, the Cap’n 
stripped, too, and between them they pried the thing 


BEACHED ON KE’ 


75 


loose from the sea growth that surrounded it. It rose 
to the surface in their arms, ominously light, even 
allowing for the buoyancy of the water. 

“She’s all et up by sea worms — but she’s an old sea 
chest, all right !” declared Cap’n Sloan, as they scraped 
away the clusters of barnacles, coral, and small pearl 
oysters that studded its sides. 

The top was a mere honeycomb, and the hinges and 
hasp long since reduced to mere splotches of rust. A 
whack with the cutlass opened the chest. Inside, it 
was packed full with tiny coral organisms, the limey 
deposits of which filled it as so much salt. Eagerly 
they pried down into the mass with the cutlasses. 
Little by little it came out, here a piece carrying with 
it the rusty outlines of an ancient pistol, its flint the 
only thing still intact; here, the network of cloth 
clothes imprinted on the coral cake; here, the green 
remains of gilt epaulettes, showing the chest to have 
belonged to some officer. A sliver of coral matrix 
came up next, bearing a line of buttons on its under 
face. They were in tolerable preservation, being of 
bronze, and on the green faces of them they could make 
out the imprint oi tiny crowns. 

“It’s the Guinea ship, son!” whooped the Cap’n. 
“I know that Portuguese crown with the oval O 
around it, myself. We’ll find somethin’ wuth while, 
yet!” 

They attacked the box savagely, its papery sides 


76 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

falling away under the cutlass blows. The green 
relics of an astrolabe came out with the coral next, 
and then George gave a cry. 

“Gold ! — father !” he yelled. 

Out of one corner of the block that represented the 
inside of the chest he had pried a canvas bag. Its 
weave alone was imprinted on the coral, but a solid 
mass of yellow coins, glued together with rusty iron 
salts, formed the core of the lump. Gold! — the one 
untamishable, imperishable thing in all that mass of 
ruin ! Its round discs shone dull yellow in the sunlight 
as they handled it. 

The Cap’n hefted it, judgmatically. 

“Twenty pounds, my lad ! Little, — but she’s heavy 
— pieces of eight, mebbe, but wuth sixteen dollars an 
ounce, about five thousand dollars. Now we got 
everything to live for, George boy! Le’s go back to 
camp, eat hearty, and take it easy. Mebbe a ship’ll 
take us off, anyway, if we h’ist a flagpole. Come July, 
we’ll sure get a proa to Macassar, and then us for 
Pearl Atoll!” 

George stood eyeing the body of the devil-fish, 
thoughtfully. Then he hacked off the tip of its beak 
with a blow of the Captain’s cutlass. 

“Nice souvenir for our what-not, back to Glouces- 
ter, — eh, father?” he grinned, pocketing it. “Le’s go !” 


CHAPTER IV! 


IN DYAK LAND 

If it hadn’t been for Migi, the further adventures 
of Captain John Sloan and his son George might have 
ended very differently. Three days after they had 
found the gold from the Portuguese wreck, he wan- 
dered into their camp on the east shore of Ke\ Out 
of the mountain jungles behind them he came, gaunt 
and famished ; but a bravely cheerful grin spread over 
his yellow-brown features, and, as he approached, 
he eyed George with the freemasonry of one boy for 
another the world over. His brown almond eyes, set 
straight in his head like a Siamese, his faded chawat 
or loin cloth, embroidered with gold thread, his close- 
woven turban of silk studded with dull jewels that 
surmounted a bang of jet black hair, all proclaimed 
him a Dyak from Borneo, probably one of some rank. 
His thin, sensitive nose had evidently been following 
the enticing scent of liver and bacon into camp, for 
his engaging grin widened and he pointed to a caved-in 
stomach and put a forefinger down an empty mouth. 

“My stars!” exploded the Cap’n. “A Dyak! In 
77 


78 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

this forsaken land of mop-haired niggers! Come in, 
boy! Give him all he can eat, George.” George 
heaped up a pearl clam shell a foot in diameter with 
food, and the Dyak youth ate ravenously, pouring out 
his thanks in mixed Malay, pidgin English, and Iwan 
or Sea Dyak, for he knew all three languages. Then 
he drank down a whole gourd of water and wiped his 
lips. 

“Me Migi,” he explained, as if that told all. 

“Awright, Migi!” grunted the Cap’n. “I guess we 
must have overlooked you at Kar. How come you 
beached on Ke’ ?” 

A lugubrious expression overcast Migi’s naturally 
merry features. “Long talk! Sad. Me tell him 
Malay tongue?” suggested the Dyak boy, politely. 

“Sure! Fire away. We got nothin’ but time on 
our hands — now!” exclaimed the Cap’n wearily. 

“Say a fikir!” quoth Migi sententiously. “All right. 
My country, big land. Far over there,” he explained, 
waving his arm over the sea to the west. 

“Yes, yes; I know. Borneo. Drive on, lad.” 

“Me live Long House, far up river. Big river i 
Samanjang.” 

“Yep. East Dutch Borneo, that is,” agreed the 
Cap’n. 

“My father, him Tama Migi Bulieng. Big chief. 
Datu,” went on Migi, proudly. “Plenty people. 
Happy. Much rice; many vases; plenty brass.” He 


IN DYAK LAND 


79 


paused, impressively. Then his face took on a tragic 
expression. “Three moons ago, fire-boat, him come. 
Shoot big gun. Fire stick (dynamite) him go Boom ! 
Small gun, he talk all time. White man burn stock- 
ade. Burn Long House. Kill men, women, children !” 
He gritted his teeth. “Ugh! Plenty bad man! Dyak 
fight hard. Sumpitan, parang, kriss. But no can do !” 
he ended, despondently. 

“What in the nation had your tribe done to deserve 
all this?” demanded the Cap’n curiously. “Been head 
hunting?” 

“No, no! No head!” Migi shook his own vigor- 
ously. “My people do nothing a-tall ! Dyak go down 
river in canoe; but fire-boat, him stop!” he nodded his 
head triumphantly. 

“What's that? The gunboat couldn’t, or didn’t, 
follow you?” questioned the Cap’n astonished. 

“No can do ! Dyak, him cut down big tapang tree. 
Fall ’cross river. Boat him in trap. All stop. No can 
go down river!” grinned Migi. 

The Cap’n pondered awhile as this situation built 
itself up in his mind. He looked over at George. The 
boy’s eyes blazed like stars ; he, too, was thinking over 
what this might mean to them. The Dyaks had cap- 
tured a small freebooters’ steamer, evidently. She was 
forfeit and would be condemned. Why not go there 
with a Dutch magistrate, assist in the capture of these 
outlaws — and buy the boat for a home for themselves? 


So THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


“Sword of Jehoshaphat, why those people were 
little better than pirates!’’ growled the Cap’n, while 
George sniffed his contempt for such renegades of his 
own race. “Attacking an unarmed Dyak village that- 
a- way! If the Dutch Government should ever hear of 
it! It’s a pity they can’t police their territory as the 
English do in Sarawak. What sort of a flag did this 
white fire-boat carry, lad?” 

Migi looked mystified, so the Cap’n drew a picture 
of a flag in the sand. Migi shook his head. “No got 
flag. Bad mans! Will sell the Dyak op’m — how you 
call him?” he groped for the word, and then made the 
expressive pantomime of the opium pipe. 

“Jerusha’s Cats! Opium smugglers, eh? And of 
course the Datu wouldn’t allow it — an’ then ye got 
into a fight. I see it all, lad!” cried the Cap’n sympa- 
thetically. “Well — and how did you get here, then, 
Migi?” 

“My father, him send me go-find great white chief.” 
(Migi meant the Dutch Resident at Banjermassin.) 
“Paddle down, down, down river. Out to sea. Then 
proa come. Kidnap Dyak boy for crew. Proa going 
to Aru, but me jump ship at Ke’ and hide in jungle. 
Me dying to go home !” he wailed, tears coming into 
his eyes. 

“So are we, lad ! So are we !” chuckled the Cap’n. 
“But how, Migi boy, how? That’s the p’int, ye see!” 

George broke into the conversation, his blue eyes 


IN DYAK LAND 


81 


flashing. “Let’s help him, anyhow, dad !” he exclaimed 
impetuously. “It’s rotten, the way this crew of opium 
smugglers have acted ! Think of the meanness of it — 
for white men ! Trying to debauch a whole village of 
natives for a few miserable dollars’ worth of opium — 
and then making war on them because the native Datu 
wouldn’t let them break their own white man’s laws! 
It makes me almost ashamed of being a white man 
myself! I say we go back to Kar, give Oku his price 
for that little proa, and then you and I and Migi can 
sail her to Pearl Atoll, get our pearls and go on to 
Borneo. That boat’s still there, I’ll bet. We can 
notify the Dutch authorities, and perhaps get a chance 
to buy the boat after she is condemned and these peo- 
ple are jailed. Le’sgo!” 

The Cap’n puffed awhile in silence. “A ship of my 
own again!” he exclaimed at last. “She’s forfeit to 
the Dyak Datu of that district, if I know sea law. Her 
people have proved themselves worse than pirates and 
plunderers. I know these Dyak chiefs. Their war- 
riors are outlying in the jungle around her now, picking 
off the crew, one by one. Remember the Tamil case, 
where a schooner full of roughnecks tried the same 
thing with a Dyak village in 1901? She lies, now, a 
hulk up the Banjora. One by one, the poisoned darts 
of the sumpitans picked them off, to the last man. 
Datu Gani told me all about it.” 

“Let’s try it, dad. It’s worth it. Give Oku ten of 


82 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


our pieces of eight, if he wants them! We’ll stop at 
Pearl Atoll and get our pearls, and then you can buy 
that boat from the Datu and we’ll have a craft of our 
own again !” he urged. 

‘‘And coal for her?” queried the Cap’n skeptically. 
“There’s not a scrap of it left aboard her by now, I’ll 
warrant !” 

“We’ll find some, up in the hills, with friendly 
Dyaks to help us. Dutch Borneo’s full of coal,” argued 
the boy. 

“Gosh-all-fishhooks, it takes a boy to ride rough- 
shod over obstacles!” laughed the Cap’n at George’s 
enthusiasm. “I’ve got a big mind to try it, though, 
at that! Anything — better than waitin’ here six 
months for the July proas!” 

With Migi fattened up and restored to his former 
merry self, they soon abandoned the palm hut camp 
and made the march back to Kar. 

“Polish up ten of those Guinea pieces, son,” ordered 
the Cap’n as they broke their last camp, just outside of 
Kar. “I’m going to dazzle old Oku. He may have 
come up in his price, you know.” 

But the grizzled Ke’ boat-builder was still willing 
to sell, and the small thirty-foot proa still lay under 
the building sheds. A dicker was- made, whereby 
she changed hands, and the next day they spent taking 
on water and stores. 

“Good-by, Ke’ !” yelled George through cupped 


IN DYAK LAND 


83 

hands, as she stood out of the anchorage at sundown, 
her one mat sail drawing rap full against the west 
monsoon. “Now for Pearl Atoll, dad !” 

She tacked fairly well, and that night they made a 
long reach half-way to the New Guinea coast. At 
sunrise she was put about, with George and Migi 
hauling on tack and sheet, and by evening they had 
raised Teor. 

“Here’s where we came to grief last time, son!” 
grunted the Cap’n, shifting the helm. “Ease off on 
that sheet. Pearl Atoll bears directly south of us, 
now.” 

The fast little proa buried her outrigger deep as she 
bore down on the lonely atoll, its palms waving in the 
steady monsoon. It was sunset when they rounded 
the inlet and stood into the calm lagoon. Not a sign 
of life on shore greeted them. 

“Those two natives we left behind got off on some 
passing canoe, I reckon,” remarked the Cap’n, calling 
George aft for a conference. “Looky here, son, I’d 
trust a Dyak ahead of all the niggers, you know, but 
we can’t be too careful about them pearls, lad. We’ll 
pretend we’re jest going in for a swim.” 

They anchored, and the Sloans stripped and plunged 
overboard, keeping a wary eye open for sharks. In a 
few moments they were ashore and standing over the 
charcoal remnants of their old brazier fire. A few 
bits of burned shellfish and some empty cocoanuts 


84 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

were all that were left to remind them of the Javanese 
sailor and the Bugis cook who had stayed on the 
island when they were wrecked here. Eager to recover 
their pearls again, George swarmed up the cocoa palm 
that the Cap’n pointed out. To his intense relief he 
found the wallet still there, securely tied among the 
broad, thick stems of the leaves. 

“Hooray — I’ve got 'em !” he whooped down, pocket- 
ing the wallet. 

“Shhh!” whispered the Cap’n angrily. “Come on 
down an' le’s see ’em.” 

George climbed down and handed over the wallet. 
The Cap’n undid its strings — and gave a low whistle 
of consternation. The contents were — pebbles! 

George gasped with disappointment as the Cap’n 
dumped the handful of worthless stones out into his 
palm. “Beats me!” muttered the old man, scratching 
his head. “What in the nation could have led those 
fellows to go up that tree? I made sure there were no 
ripe cocoanuts on it, that night, before I came down.” 

“But you didn’t!” cried George, pointing upward. 
A small cluster of nuts hung below the stems, almost 
concealed by the foliage. The tree had ripened them 
while they were gone ! 

“Don’t it beat all!” groaned the Cap’n. “You can’t 
beat Nature down in these parts, by gurry ! She’s alius 
doin’ somethin’ to upset the best plans ye make! 
Which way d’ye suppose they went with our pearls, 


IN DYAK LAND 


85 

son? Matabello Islands, most likely. We’re goin’ to 
need that steamboat, now! I’ll chase that Javanese all 
over the Archipelago, but I’ll git him or the pearls, if 
we have to stay five years to do it !” 

“Suppose we tell Migi all about it?” suggested 
George. “Set a native to catch a native, you know. 
He’ll do anything for us, now.” 

“Mought,” agreed the Cap’n lifelessly. “Well, 
what do we do now? Go on to Borneo, or try to get 
track of that Javanese at Matabello?” 

“Matabello first. He’ll make straight for Amboina’s 
my guess.” 

“I doubt if he’ll go near Amboina. They’d ask 
him too many questions before they’d ’ever buy his 
pearls. We’ll touch at Matabello to-morrow.” 

Dejectedly they swam out to the proa, where George 
told the whole story of the lost pearls to Migi. The 
Dyak’s warm brown eyes were full of sympathy as he 
listened. He was divided between his yearning to 
return to his own people and his loyalty to the Sloans 
who had befriended him, but the latter sentiment 
easily won. 

“Me go! Me catch’m Java-boy!” he assured them. 
“Me drop off proa at Matabello. Swim ashore. You 
go-long. Ask plenty question. All tell heap lies. Me 
find out!” 

The subtle native cunning of the true Islander shone 
in the Dyak lad’s eyes as he explained his plan. If 


86 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


any one could find out the truth about those pearls it 
would be Migi. But, in spite of the wave of confi- 
dence that their new native ally inspired, George could 
not sleep that night. Action, action, action ! He 
longed for daylight, to be under way and doing, to 
end this gnawing suspense. Their whole fortune had 
been lost by the simplest natural circumstance in the 
world, the ripening of a bunch of cocoanuts. That a 
palm would mature a few green nuts in the short 
time they were away had not been foreseen by either 
of them. The place looked the safest and most 
unguessable hiding place in the world, but mere animal 
hunger had led a stupid Javanese sailor up the one 
tree in the world where their treasure had been hid. 
Well, no use repining over what was done and beyond 
recall ! As the Cap’n, sleeping soundly, no doubt had 
philosophized. 

Next day the proa ran over in a broad reach to the 
Matabello Islands. They are formed by gradual sea 
bottom subsidence, causing submerged coral barrier 
reefs instead of the atoll formation of building coral, 
and they are part of what was once a long peninsula 
extending out from Ceram. The inhabitants are low 
caste mixed Papuan and Malay races, living in a very 
humble way, fishing and making an occasional cargo 
of copra to attract the passing trader. 

Migi slipped out on the outrigger while they were 
maneuvering off the barrier reef for an opening. He 


IN DYAK LAND 


87 

pointed to a far-off cape to the east. ‘‘Me there, come 
dark,” he told them as he went overboard on the off- 
shore side. 

They watched him anxiously, fearing sharks, until 
his head gradually was lost to view among the waving 
branches of seaweed that dotted the submerged barrier 
reef. Then they found a gap in it for the proa and 
stood in toward the sand beaches of the mainland. 
A cluster of huts under the usual beach palms 
attracted them as the proa neared shore. A few apa- 
thetic natives came down to greet them. Stupid and 
incurious, they accepted the Cap’n’s greetings and 
tobacco stolidly, but to all questions as to two stran- 
gers having come that way recently they proved either 
evasive or else emphatic with downright denials — too 
emphatic, it seemed to George, who was listening and 
using his eyes avidly. After a day among them the 
Cap’n gave it up. They had brought nothing to 
trade, so in a short time the natives had become sullen 
and uncommunicative. 

“Sins of Nebuchadnezzar!” snorted the Cap’n 
exasperatedly, as they boarded the proa again, “This 
passel of niggers is the stupidest yet, son! Ain’t none 
of them got the brains they was bom with ! Le’s hope 
Migi’s had better luck than we hev !” 

They set sail, and as darkness fell reached the dis- 
tant cape. Migi was waiting for them. He came out 
hand over hand, in the fast native crawl stroke. 


88 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


“Me find’m!” he grinned. “Old woman, he talk, 
plenty too-much! Chief, him give Java man canoe. 
Gone to New Guinea.” 

“New Guinea !” echoed George and the Cap’n in a 
breath. There was a moment of astonished, reflective 
silence. 

“Le’s see, son,” mused the Cap’n, as he began to get 
his bearings on this astounding fact. “0/ course he 
went there, come to think of it! It’s only fifty-odd 
miles from here, and that Javanese knew mighty well 
not to go to Amboina with all them pearls. They’d 
ask him too many questions as to how he came by ’em. 
And I know jest where he’s gone, too!” he declared, 
with sudden conviction. 

“Where, dad?” asked George, who had been listen- 
ing without enthusiasm. “It looks, now, more than 
ever hopeless to me! I s’pose he’ll keep on, clear 
down to Port Moresby.” 

“Not in a canoe, lad! Not along that squally coast, 
with cannibal lakatois sailin’ the seas!” chortled the 
Cap’n happily. “Nope. He’s made for that lagoon 
up at the head of Evans Bay. There’s an old Outanata 
chief there who don't ask any questions. That old 
rapscallion’s one-quarter pirate and the other three- 
quarters of him’s jest plain thief and murderer — an’ 
you can lay to that, my lad ! There ain’t been a shady 
transaction in all the Pearl Fisheries these last ten 
years that that old deevil hasn’t had a finger in.” 


IN DYAK LAND 89 

“Fat chance to get ’em back from him, then, dad!” 
sniffed George bitterly. 

“Not in this proa,” agreed Captain Sloan. “We’d 
all be murdered and eaten, the first of his lakatois that 
boarded us. We need Migi’s fire-boat to do that trick. 
We’ll go get her! Ready about, lads; Borneo for 
ours!” 

They jumped to the sheets and the proa was headed 
south-southwest for the volcanic island of Nilu. Sun- 
rise of next day raised its active column of smoke out 
of the sea and they went about and stood on the star- 
board tack nearly up to Ceram. Another long reach 
brought them down toward Timor, passing the lurid 
glare of the Api volcano by night. Followed two days 
of tacking through the deep waters of the Floris Sea, 
with islets sighted on every hand. It was anxious navi- 
gating, in so small a ship, but the monsoon held steady, 
broken only by an occasional thunder squall. Then 
the long tack from Floris to Borneo took two days 
more, and on the evening of the third they had reached 
the mouth of the Samanjang River. Its bar was piled 
high with great dead trees. The Cap’n had to display 
some pretty seamanship to work through at all, but 
Migi’s eyes sang with happiness. Here was home to 
him! One more day, up through the lowlands of the 
interior, with the river banks bordered with the 
feathery fronds of the nipa palm, and then would begin 


go THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the great jungles in which the Dyak boy had lived all 
his life, except for his exile on Ke\ 

As the river led them into the high jungle, George 
watched the great forest closing all about them with 
the keenest interest. Never had he seen such wonder- 
ful arches of foliage, towering far overhead, festooned 
with hanging vines, hazy with the sunlit mists of rank 
vegetation. Mighty tapang trees, a hundred and fifty 
feet high, with smooth buttress wing roots supporting 
their lower trunks, rose up along the banks. Other 
tall trees grew on stilts, with their roots reaching down 
to the soil in tripods far higher than a man’s head. 
Everywhere was green, with the flash of sunlight on 
shining leaves and the call of birds and insects filling 
the drowsy depths of the forest. 

Their proa’s progress had slowed down to a mere 
creep against the strong current, when a long, low 
canoe shot around a bend upstream. Two muscular 
paddlers in her, with flat straw hats a yard in diameter, 
swung her around as she headed downstream toward 
them. 

“My people!” yelled Migi, beside himself with 
excitement, while happy tears filled his eyes. He 
sprang up in the bows of the proa and yelled at them 
in Iwan Dyak. 

The foremost paddler put down a long blowgun in 
his hands and waved his paddle. In long sweeps she 
shot down towards them, bows on. George noted 


IN DYAK LAND 


9i 


curiously that she was built of half the straight trunk 
of a huge tree, with a crocodile head carved on its 
prow. 

“Kubing ! Kubing !” screamed Migi, dancing about 
and waving his arms in unrestrained joy. 

The forward Dyak boated his paddle with astonish- 
ment. “Migi!” he yelled. Down she swooped, in a 
riot of calls, question and answer. The stern man 
laid the canoe alongside and they leaped aboard and 
dashed for Migi. They rubbed noses with him, they 
pummeled him, all three danced about the deck with 
the fervor of reunion. George secured the canoe, while 
the Cap’n held his course, smiling on them benignly. 

Kubing and the other Dyak at length turned, to look 
sternly at the Sloans over their shoulder, and the older 
man laid hand on the hilt of his parang. Muttered 
questionings flew between them. 

“But these are good white men!” laughed Migi in 
Malay, so the Sloans could understand. 

“There are no good white men! Devils, all!” 
retorted the deep voice of the elder Dyak, whose tiger- 
tooth ear ornaments proclaimed him a sub-chief. 

“How about Rajah Brooke, the best white man the 
Dyak ever knew?” smiled the Cap’n at him. 

The man’s stern face lit up. “Are — are you — Rajah 
Brooke ?” he asked in Malay, delightedly. 

“No, not me; he’s English. Cousins of ours, they 
be,” replied the Cap’n. Migi interrupted, to tell them 


92 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

all about himself, and a long colloquy in Iwan went on. 
At length he turned to the Sloans. 

“My father, Tama Bulieng, the Datu, him build’m 
new Long House, up river. Bad white men still here. 
Only few left. Our warriors kill plenty,” he said, 
proudly. “You go-long us, in canoe. Tie up proa 
here. My white father very welcome to the Dyaks,” 
he grinned, beaming on the Cap’n. 

They moored the proa to a great root and got into 
the canoe. Further upstream they met a large roofed 
canoe which turned out to belong to Datu Bulieng 
himself, and there was a still more affecting reunion 
as Migi sprang to his aged arms. He was a tall, stem 
Dyak, grim of feature, and wore the high plumes of 
the rhinoceros hornbill in token of his rank, while a 
cotton jacket with rows of silver buttons covered his 
muscular but elderly body. He greeted Cap’n Sloan 
cordially, after Migi had told about their friendship, 
and invited George and he to share the shade of his 
palm-roofed boat. 

Half an hour’s paddling through the tall, sunlit 
arches of the jungle brought them to a landing where 
dozens of log canoes were hauled up. Above it 
stretched across the river the mighty trunk of a 
tapang tree spanning it from bank to bank. 

“Him block fire-boat, so no can come down,” 
explained Migi, as the Sloans looked at it curiously. 

The chief led the way ashore, and they went along 


IN DYAK LAND 


93 


a trail deep into the jungle to where Long House 
loomed up through palm and banana foliage. Ascend- 
ing notched logs, they found themselves on a veritable 
street laid on heavy beams, with a flooring of hewn 
logs far above the jungle floor. A huge palm-thatched 
roof loomed overhead, with open doorways leading to 
the various family rooms of the community lining one 
side of the street. Pretty Dyak girls, wearing corse- 
lets of brass rings and richly embroidered sarongs, 
giggled at them shyly as they went by, and naked 
children peered at them from the room doors. The 
men were all away, either working in the rice fields 
or outlying around the smugglers’ boat. 

Datu Bulieng led the way to the head house, with 
its rafters hung with dried human skulls in rows, the 
village’s trophy hall from former wars. Here visitors 
and the unmarried men slept. The Datu sent out an 
order for council and presently the Dyak men came 
trooping in. Dressed much as Migi was, their splen- 
did physiques shone brown and naked, except for the 
chawat or loin cloth, their necklaces of woven fiber 
adorned with silver buttons, their leg and arm circlets, 
and the delicate, lacy tattooing that each man wore 
on arms and shoulders. Migi as interpreter was in 
his element. Before them all he told of his capture by 
the Bugis prau, his exile on Ke’ and how the white 
men had befriended him and brought him safely home. 
The Sloans could see more and more friendly glances 


94 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

thrown their way as the excited Dyak boy told of his 
adventures, and when he ended a mighty shout of 
approval went up. Never before had human beings 
looked on them with such beaming good-will, it seemed 
to George and the Cap’n, as among these “savage” 
folk. 

A long palaver in mixed Malay and Dyak ensued. 
The Datu offered them the fire-boat free if they would 
help him end the smugglers once for all in a pitched 
battle, but the Cap’n finally convinced him that it was 
their duty to arrest them, as they would probably sur- 
render to a white man, and take them down river to 
the Dutch Resident. So, on the next day all the fight- 
ing men of the tribe went up river. These were war 
canoes, this time, great catamarans with high bamboo 
fighting superstructures that held twenty warriors each, 
armed with sumpitans, parangs and a few Singapore 
muskets that had found their way even into this remote 
interior. 

By noon the smugglers’ boat came in sight. She lay 
anchored up river, small and dilapidated, her paint 
all gone, her bright work green with rust. A one- 
pounder mounted in her waist, probably a condemned 
naval weapon with worn-out rifling, showed itself 
swathed in ragged canvas. 

A stentorian hail from the Cap’n brought a few tat- 
tered, bearded men, armed with rifles, to her rails. 

“Ship ahoy! Any of ye speak English aboard 


IN DYAK LAND 


95 


there?” shouted the Cap’n as the catamaran hove to. 

There was a wild commotion among the dirty raga- 
muffins on her decks. 

“Blymme! A white man, at last!” yelled one of 
them whose weatherbeaten blue jacket showed him 
her master. “Lawd! Lawd! Lawd!” he whooped. 

“Stop Lording an’ listen to me !” snapped the Cap’n 
testily. “You people may be white, but you’re no 
better than durned pirates, an’ ye can lay to that, me 
lads !” called out the Cap’n sturdily. “Hanging is too 
good for ye, after what I hear ye done to this Dyak 
village. The Datu, here, has come up river to finish 
ye all off, right now! Hev ye anything to say for 
y’reselves?” 

The smuggler captain held up his hand. “One 
moment, my friend. You are a white man, eh? And 
you’ll stand by and see us all murdered?” he whined. 

“Nope,” yelled the Cap’n. “It’s jest because ye’re 
white that I’m givin’ ye this chance. Will you sur- 
render to me, if I give ye safe passage down to the 
sea, where we can turn you over to the Dutch Resi- 
dent, to be dealt with according to law?” 

There was a rapid fire of excited talk among the 
survivors on the boat. It grew to a close conference, 
as their voices dropped, while the Sloans and Datu 
Buiieng waited grimly. 

Finally the master came to the rail. “We agree to 
it!” he called out. “At sunset to-day we turn over 


9 6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

this boat to the Dyaks, in your presence as a white 
witness. That ought to help us with the Judge, eh, 
Captain?” he whined in a strong Cockney accent. 
“And we go down in our own ship’s boat, too,” he 
demanded, cheekily. 

The Cap’n turned to Datu Bulieng for conference. 
The old fellow shrugged his shoulders. What he 
wanted was a free-for-all fight, right now! But he 
gave way to the Cap’n at last. 

“All right, but you’ll go down, guarded all the way 
by Dyak war canoes, my man — and no monkey busi- 
ness, either!” he warned. “Put aboard what stores 
you need. Your rifles and ammunition you leave 
behind. That is the best I can do for you, my man,” 
concluded the Cap’n, ending the conference. 

George grasped his father’s ami as their catamaran 
swung about to paddle a short distance downstream. 
“Dad — I don’t like this at all,” he objected warily. 
“Those fellows are still full of fight. Why should 
they want until sunset to get ready ” 

“Tut, tut, son! Think of that long voyage along 
the coast! They’ve got stores to load, the boat to 
overhaul and mebbe repair small leaks, sails and gear 
to bend — don’t worry, lad !” he reassured him, turning 
away to talk to the Datu about the trip down to 
Banjermassin. 

But George was unconvinced and suspicious. These 
very men had turned pirates and plunderers when 


IN DYAK LAND 


97 


released from all law and restraint up here in the 
jungle. They were of that evil type which never can 
be trusted. Suppose they were, right now, preparing 
some trick, hoping to escape in their ship’s boat in the 
confusion? He begged the unsuspicious Captain to 
let him and Migi at least try to board her and watch 
what was going on, unseen themselves, and at last 
obtained a reluctant permission. 

He sought out Migi and the two boys cudgeled their 
brains for some plan to board her. How to do it in 
broad daylight was something of a poser, but a clump 
of water hyacinth floating by gave George an idea, and 
Migi agreed with him that it might be feasible. 
Undressing, they slipped over the catamaran’s side, 
downstream and out of sight of the little steamer. 
Their only present danger was from the crocodiles that 
infested the Samanjang, but they got around a bend 
and swam ashore without encountering one. Once in 
the jungle they circled until they reached a point above 
the steamer where Migi knew of a hyacinth swamp. 
Then they spent the afternoon in fashioning two head 
nets of the bulbous plants, in which they could float 
downstream with their faces concealed in the thick 
foliage. The muddy water could be depended upon 
to conceal their bodies, if careful to tread water 
upright on approaching the steamer. 

An hour before sunset they were ready, and swam 
out in midstream. Diving under their tangled head 


98 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

nets, they floated down silently, guiding themselves 
with an occasional arm stroke. The little steamer 
seemed deserted as they bore down on her and gripped 
her rusty anchor chain. George loosened the flap of 
his automatic and climbed up the chain, with Migi 
following, armed only with the kriss in his belt. 
Peering cautiously over the bows, they saw the empty 
forecastle deck lying before them. A ragged jib 
hung in tatters from its lifts. George and Migi con- 
cealed themselves under its folds and watched. 

One bearded ruffian was standing on watch beside 
the engine-room hatch. The rest were all below, and 
a mutter of voices and the steady chink of hammer 
strokes came from the engine room ! George stiffened 
with anger. What could they be doing to the engine ! 
They weren’t keeping faith with Datu Bulieng and 
the Captain at all events. 

Then a hail from below to bear a hand called the 
guard down the ladder. Seizing their chance, George 
and Migi raced across the deck and slipped into the 
forecastle. It was empty. They shut the door and 
locked it inside. 

“Well, we’re here — and something’s up!” laughed 
George nervously at Migi. “If we call the Captain, 
it means a fight. S’pose we can go it alone?” 

Migi grinned and held up five fingers, shaking his 
head. 

“Five men against two boys — fat chance !” groaned 


IN DYAK LAND 


99 


George, feeling that this time he had taken on a good 
deal too large a contract. Then a coat, hanging on a 
hook, gave him a ray of hope. Its owner would come 
for it, sooner or later, and they could nab him. Then 
another would come for him! “A mouse trap, Migi; 
gorry, what an idea! ,, whispered George, pointing to 
the coat. “Let’s find some rope.” 

There was none in the forecastle, but some old life 
preservers under the bunks gave them plenty of straps. 
Migi then opened the door and the boys hid behind it, 
George hoping that his luck would hold and they 
would not all come together ! Cautiously he unlocked 
the door waiting for the first victim. 

The noise of hammer and cold chisel kept up in the 
engine room, and they could hear two men on the deck 
loading the boat with stores. Then a sudden thought 
struck George, freezing the blood in his veins with an 
icy chill. There was ammunition aboard for the one- 
pounder, plenty of it, most likely. Suppose they were 
mining the ship with it! Where was it kept? How 
would it be arranged to touch ofif? The idea sent him 
into a frenzy, yet there was no way to explore out 
of the forecastle. The ammunition would be kept aft, 
if anywhere. That — would have to wait! 

After a long time, heavy footsteps approached the 
forecastle door, and the boys stiffened for action. The 
owner of the coat was coming for it! The minute he 
stepped inside both boys pounced on him. He was a 


100 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


powerful man but no match for Migi’s native strength 
and agility. A brief, silent struggle ended in the man 
lying bound and gagged before them on the floor. 

“One!” crowed George, dancing about the empty 
forecastle with Migi. “The Mouse Trap's working 
fine ! Next !” 

They had not long to wait, for the smugglers were 
now embarking. There were callings and runnings 
to and fro and shouted orders. Presently footsteps 
came running for the forecastle. 

“Now then, Bill — lively does it !” called the master's 
voice authoritatively. He stepped inside. 

“Gow -ding it!” he gasped, choking into silence as 
Migi's fingers closed around his throat. They bore 
him to the floor, and, when he ceased to struggle, tied 
him securely. 

“Two!” whispered George, in suppressed giggles — 
“Hist!” 

“Ready-o, Cap! I say in there!” called a hurried 
voice outside. Then it stopped, suspiciously, as no 

answer came. “What the !” he ejaculated, but he 

stopped right there, for George confronted him with 
leveled automatic. “Don’t move — and don’t yell!” 
gritted the boy quietly as his man went limp, thunder- 
struck. Migi slipped around him and yanked his 
hands down behind his back. Then they shoved him 
into the forecastle and tied him up. 

“Now for the last two, Migi !” said George, running 


IN DYAK LAND 


IOI 


out on deck. They found them already in the boat, 
waiting for their comrades. Leaving Migi to guard 
them with the automatic, George hurried to the after 
cabin, fearing the worst, but determined to risk all 
rather than be too late. 

He stopped before a fine, almost invisible wire that 
stretched across the cabin door! 

“So that’s their game, eh?” he whistled, softly. 
“We were to come aboard, and blow her up ourselves, 
with that thing!” He eyed it gingerly, and then 
stooped under the wire, most carefully, and got inside 
the cabin. A faint light showed through a locker 
panel, into which the wire led. He opened the door 
little by little — and an ingenious infernal machine met 
his eyes. It was just a lighted candle, burning placidly, 
but back of it was an open one-pounder shell, while 
the candle was set on a case of them, the brass sides of 
the uppermost already filed through and the powder 
showing! A man entering the cabin door carelessly 
would pull the wire and tip over the open shell on the 
candle and set the whole case off! 

George blew out the candle and worked his way out, 
leaving everything just as it was. It sickened him to 
know that men of his own race could be so vile, that 
when men once descended to piracy and lawlessness 
this would be the inevitable result — callousness to 
human life, treachery to the chance friend, and all the 


102 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


malignant devils of revenge, hatred and envy reigning 
over their souls. 

He went out on deck, feeling somehow older and 
sadder. He had looked into the Pit, and he loathed 
the memory of it. 

“Catamaran ahoy!” he called out from the stern rail. 
“Oh, father ! Come aboard — she’s ready to turn over 
to the Dutch Government.” 


CHAPTER V 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 

“Hi, George — d’ye want to go home?” called 
Captain John Sloan, quizzically, his eyes twinkling as 
he came up the log ladder to the high street of Long 
House. Datu Bulieng, the Dyak chief, and his party 
followed him, and news was written all over their 
faces. 

George had been sitting on a rattan bunk in the 
head house of the Datu’s Dyak community. Migi 
was with him, the two youths chatting light-heartedly. 
As he rose to greet his father, his eye roved down the 
cool, shady length of the long aerial street under its 
huge roof of palm thatch. Overhead, rows of great 
beams crossed horizontally. To his right the split 
plank walls of the family rooms partitioned the 
immense building, with their open doorways, and their 
ax-hewn rice mortars standing like V-shaped troughs 
in long rows along the wall. On the floor in front of 
him lay a palm mat, with a pile of unwinnowed rice, 
which a pretty Dyak girl had just left to go fetch her 
scoop-shaped winnowing basket. Outside towered 
103 


104 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the great, green, sunlit jungle, noisy with birds, flash- 
ing with metallic blue and green butterflies, alive with 
the pulsing, vivid splendor of the tropics. 

“I — don’t — know, father,” replied the boy, stretch- 
ing lazily. ‘They say the East gets you, sooner or 
later. This jungle’s got me, I’ll say ! I never saw such 
trees anywhere! One of them I measured the other 
day had a trunk forty feet across its wing roots. 
Migi looked like a pygmy standing in the flat curve of 
one of them. But — did you get the ship, dad?” he 
broke off to inquire, eagerly. 

“We did !” retorted the Cap’n, emphatically. “Land’s 
Cats, we did, son! This Assistant Resident’s a young 
feller, Lieutenant Hobbema, aged twenty-two. Good 
sort! He jailed that crew, took over the steamer, and 
sold her to me in one, two, three order. You and Migi 
have got to go down to Court to testify, in a couple of 
months — whenever the judge gets around to this dis- 
trict. Meanwhile we’ll run over to New Guinea after 
our pesky pearls, son. I’ve got coal. We’ll hev to 
drift her down the Samanjang to meet a junk of it 
that I chartered from a Chinese.” 

The Cap’n sat down, breathing thickly after this long 
speech, and mopping the perspiration from his ruddy 
brow. Although there was a breeze stirring, it was 
hot, even under the shade of the great roof of Long 
House. Migi and the Dyaks were crowding around 
Datu Bulieng, plying him with questions about the 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


105 

great world outside, so George and his father were 
left to themselves for awhile. 

“Seems to me that boat will be home to us for some 
time yet, father/’ said George. “She’s home enough 
for me! I know every foot of her now, and she’s a 
little dandy!” exclaimed the boy enthusiastically. 
“We’ll name her the Mattie, after Datu Bulieng’s 
daughter — shall we say, Miss Bulieng?” he laughed. 

“Sure! Mauie ’tis, if you want it! Welp; she’s 
ourn, anyhow!” grunted the Cap’n contentedly. “I 
sold our pieces-of -eight, off the Guinea wreck, and 
have about a thousand dollars gold left, after paying 
for this midget steamer and buying coal and stores. 
We’ll go aboard this afternoon, git up her anchor, and 
drop down to the great tree until the Datu has it cut 
in two.” 

They went up with a party of Dyaks, after the mid- 
day curry and rice. George had spent at least half his 
time on her while the Cap’n had been away. She was 
already home to him. About a hundred and ten feet 
long, she had evidently been a former English steam 
yacht, converted to a small trading steamer. A trunk 
cabin had been added forward, extending for some 
thirty-five feet aft, where it fell away to a long waist, 
coming up again for a poop cabin for her officers’ 
quarters. On her had been mounted an old one- 
pounder on a naval base, aft of her long, low engine 
house. A single funnel and a signal mast, with a 


io6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


serviceable yard for a foresail to set in favorable 
winds, completed her rig. 

As a small, inter-island trading ship she would be 
perfection George thought. He had investigated the 
engine room. The guides and piston rods of her 
hundred-horse compound engine had been chipped and 
scored by the renegade machinists, but the boy had 
discovered spare ones under the engine floor, and he 
and Migi had put in much time replacing them. All 
she needed now was coal. 

“Humph !” ejaculated the Cap’n, as they stepped 
aboard. “We’ll go aground on half the bends and bars 
of the river without steam, son! And I’ll bet her 
bottom’s a sight! Nice little craft, though! Better’n 
the old Kazmni , eh?” he chuckled. 

“You bet! What’s the matter with charcoal for the 
fires, dad? We can build a kiln and make enough to 
get down the river. Wonder the smugglers didn’t try 
it themselves.” 

“Hi!” grinned Migi. “No can do!” He made the 
expressive pantomime of the sumpitan, with his cupped 
fist to lips. “White man keep close to him boat! 
Must be!” 

“Hosts of Pharaoh, I’ll bet ’twas as much as a 
man’s life was wuth to forage for food at all !” sniffed 
the Cap’n warmly. “Welp ; le’s up anchor and beach 
her down by the big tree, anyway. A clean bottom’ll 
help some*” 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


107 


Stalwart Dyak youths manned her capstan bars, and 
after tremendous efforts the anchor was torn from the 
river bottom where it had lain so long. The Mauie, 
as she was re-named, drifted downstream, guided by 
a long Dyak canoe with ten paddlers in it and a coir 
rope leading out over her stern chock. 

“Boy, you mought as well git your charcoal cornin’, 
now — but what’s the matter with us finding our own 
coal mine ?” queried the Cap’n cannily. “I’ll bet these 
hills are full of coal. Tradin’ll be one gran’ sweet 
song, if all we got to do for more coal is to run up here 
and take it — eh?” he guffawed at George, hilariously. 
Having a ship of his own again seemed to make a new 
man of the Cap’n. George felt that he had never seen 
his father so cheerful since they had lost the Kawani, 
and his own heart sang with happiness to see the old 
man a brisk and forceful sea-captain once more. 

It took oceans of talk and pantomime to explain to 
Datu Bulieng what coal was. Stones that would burn ! 
Incredible ! Yes, certain black stones would burn, they 
assured him. Migi got the idea, after George had 
done a vigorous pantomime before the boiler and 
shown him a few bits scraped out of the bunkers. 
After two days of search, Dyak runners came back 
to Long House bearing bags of stones. Among them 
they found pieces of lignite — brown coal, but they 
would burn ! 

Meanwhile great skid trees had been felled into the 


io8 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


river, and the Mauie had been hauled out on the impro- 
vised marine railway. Long fringes of river weed 
and untold mud were scraped off her bottom, but, as 
the Samanjang was fresh water up at Long House, no 
borers or barnacles had attacked her and she went 
overboard again, sound and tight. 

The great tapang tree was next chopped in two and 
its ends floated open like a great gate. Steam was 
raised over the brown coal. The Cap’n gave George 
and Migi a thorough drilling on how to run a marine 
engine and showed them how to work the water out 
of her and warm her up preparatory to starting. A 
few days later, for the first time in five months, her 
gong clanged in the engine room and George and Migi 
threw the ram over and the screw revolved astern. 

“Hip! Hip! — We’re off!” shouted George, popping 
his head up out of the engine hatch to see the banks 
go by. His father and two Dyak helmsmen were up 
on the bridge, while Datu Bulieng and the villagers 
waved them good-by from the landing. Then the 
Mauie dropped from view of them around a bend, and 
black smoke from her funnel filled the high arches of 
the jungle. 

There was little time for George to reflect on leaving 
hospitable Long House and all their Dyak friends. 
Bells came thick and fast, as bend after bend required 
slowing, stopping or reversing the engine. Migi 
proved an apt pupil, and the two boys had a glorious 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 109 

time, busy as bees, between the fires, the pumps and 
condensers, the reverse ram and the main throttle 
lever. They passed their little Ke’ proa, still tied to 
her root, and then came the long reaches of the lower 
river, with waving walls of the fern-like fronds of 
the nipa palm, rising half -submerged from the brackish 
water. Great flocks of white herons gathered on ahead 
of the Midget Steamer, as the Cap’n called her, during 
her swift course down the reaches. Tfie Mauie was 
fast; even with brown coal she was doing all of ten 
knots. With soft black coal she would go fourteen. 

It was nightfall when they wormed through the 
barrier of great dead trees at the river mouth bar, bat- 
tled through the surf rip of the open water, and stood 
out over the smooth swells of the Java Sea. A light 
gleamed offshore. It proved to be their coal barge, a 
big Chinese junk, anchored, her square sails furled, 
her crew of Celestials lazing away the hours of wait- 
ing for them. 

“Huang Wu, ahoy!” hailed Cap’n Sloan, as the 
Mauie ran alongside and stopped her engines. As she 
lost way, the two Dyak deck hands forward dropped 
the anchor and she drifted astern to its scope, until 
both boats swung together head to the wind. 

“Pretty flying moor! Gee, dad’s some seaman!” 
ejaculated George, watching it from the engine hatch. 
“Ring off, Migi! All oil siphons out! I’ll be down 
to bank fires directly.” 


no THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


A huge camel, made of a stout bamboo with a mat 
buffer on it, was run out from the towering walls of 
the junk, so that the pitching vessels were fended off 
yet held together by their mooring cables. Across it, 
as on a boat-boom, lines of cooties tripped, carrying 
coal baskets, stores, water breakers, tools, trading 
goods, everything needful that the Cap’n had bought 
in Banjermassin. The human bucket-chain was quick 
and effective. 

“Hand-somely with that paint, lads!” bawled the 
Cap’n as tubs of lead and oil came over, slung on 
wooden yokes. “Paint! Jerusha’s Cats, she’s a holy 
sight ! I’d never dare show myself in the Islands look- 
ing this-away! All clear there, Huang!” 

The Chinese captain sent over the tally of stores. 
The Cap’n checked it over. 

“C’rect ! ’Way camel, there ! Stand by the engines, 
George!” Clang! went the gong, and the engine 
responded with the quick thump of its piston rods. 
The new black coal came tumbling out the bunker 
doors; the fires roared; steam rose to a hundred and 
fifty pounds, as the Mauie forged ahead through the 
dark waters. 

By sunrise they were off the Luari Islands, with the 
coast of Borneo far over the horizon. Proa sails dotted 
the sea; here and there a venturesome fisherman’s 
canoe far offshore. Passing Celebes they made the 
Boutong Passage next day and then laid course on the 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


hi 


great circle past Bouru and Ceram. The evening of 
the fourth day saw them raising the high, mountainous 
coasts of Dutch New Guinea, with an occasional 
glimpse of the snow mountains of the interior inland 
through the rifts in the cloud banks. 

The Midget Steamer was now all in gleaming white, 
for the Dyaks had been busy painting over her sides. 
A coat of war gray would have passed her for some 
small gunboat of our own flag, down from Mindanao; 
indeed, she was spoken as such by several passing 
liners of the Singapore-Australia service. 

But she looked tiny enough as she stood in under the 
towering ramparts of the New Guinea mountains. Off 
the Capes she pitched and rolled in the stormy chop sea 
that came up from the inexhaustible south, out of the 
shallow waters of the pearl fisheries. The mountains 
at this part of the coast come close down to the sea, 
enclosing in their rock-ribbed arms a deep bay, with a 
long lagoon extending up inland from the head of it. 

George and Migi eyed it curiously. It was the first 
time either of them had been to Cannibal Land. A 
stern, rough, savage coast, inhospitable alike to man 
and vessel. The smoke of native signal fires rose from 
the Capes on either hand as she turned into the road- 
stead from the open sea. Two miles further up the 
bay, a lakatoi or native war catamaran was discovered, 
tacking across the lagoon under her single huge lateen, 
her superstructure crowded with mop-haired blacks, 


1 12 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


their bows and spears jutting up out of the mass of 
dark bodies like a miniature forest. At sight of the 
Mauie standing in, they hastily veered out sheet and 
made all sail up the lagoon. 

“Gee, they love us, don’t they!” grinned George at 
Migi, after peering below to see if the engine was doing 
well. 

The Dyak boy touched his arm and pointed toward 
the belt of mangroves that lined the shores : “Black- 
boy, him watch,” he said. 

George scanned the green shores in vain. “As 
Assistant Scrutineer of this engine, you’re some looker, 
Migi! Danged if / see anything or anybody!” 

“Look-see!” insisted Migi, pointing again. George 
sighted along his finger. 

“Now, I see ’em! Gee-roo! Swinging along 
through the trees back of those mangroves like a 
troop of monkeys! So this is Paris, eh? Cannibals, 
all of them — fine people !” he grinned. 

Migi nodded. “Him kai-kcd (eat) white boy, plenty, 
too-much !” he declared vigorously. 

“Thank you, too much — I’d rather not!” snickered 
George. “But say, Migi, you and I gotta go ashore 
here, if we’re ever going to find those pearls! I sup- 
pose father’ll run up to the village for a pow-wow. 
He’ll have to be mighty cute, to get anything out of 
that old Outanata chief. Le’s you and I pull that 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


ii3 

Matabello Island stunt of yours again, and do a scout 
ashore of our own, on the side?” 

Migi’s eyes sparkled. A bushwhacking adventure 
of this sort just suited him! 

“Mind the engine, fellah — I’ll go ask the Cap’n 
about it,” said George, leaving to go forward on the 
bridge. 

He outlined his plan. The Cap’n listened, and shot 
in questions at intervals, while the Midget Steamer 
plowed further and further up the lagoon, which 
had now narrowed to less than a mile in width. 

“I dunno, son,” rumbled the Cap’n, noncommittally, 
when George had said all he could for his plan. “We’ll 
need every man on board, if it comes to a fight. These 
people are bad, and I’m depending on you to man the 
one-pounder, while I maneuver the ship. We gotta 
have one Dyak steersman at the wheel and t’other to 
protect him with his shield and parang. That leaves 
Migi at the engine, and the two deck hands to pass 
ammunition or bear a hand with their blowguns. I 
expect to begin throwing dynamite sticks, if it gets too 
warm ! It’s a wild country, son, and I hate to let you 
two boys ashore in it. I want the one-pounder loaded 
right now.” 

George left the bridge and set about getting up the 
ammunition. He slipped the canvas cover off the 
gun, stowed a case of the shells under the one-pounder 
and put a shell into her breech. While he was at it, 


1 1 4 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the gong rang and Migi stopped the engine. The 
Mauie sheered to starboard. Cap’n Sloan stumped 
over to the port bridge as she lost headway and slowed 
down to a drift. 

George ran over to the port rail. The lakatoi had 
come back again down the lagoon, the incurved cor- 
ners of her mat sail sticking up like a fan. She rose 
out of the sea like a castle, and the rows of long oval 
shields carried by the warriors on her fighting deck 
looked like oblong white eggs stood on end. Her peo- 
ple were yelling derision and defiance at them, 
brandishing their bows and spears, evidently bent on 
boarding them summarily. 

“Of all the nerve !” exploded the Cap’n testily. 
“Fire a shot across her bows, son ! We can’t let these 
niggers come within bowshot of us.” 

George put his shoulder to the one-pounder, swung 
her muzzle across the lakatoi’s bows and pulled trig- 
ger. The sharp report and cloud of white smoke was 
answered by the zipping ricochet of the shell as it 
skipped and dived across the lagoon, throwing up 
splashes of spray and exploding in a puff of smoke as 
it struck a tree in the jungle. 

“Avast, there! Heave to!” yelled the Cap’n. 
“Hosts of Pharaoh, — why, it’s Yow-uta himself. 
Yow, ahoy, there!” he called out as George slipped 
in another shell. 

There was a chattering commotion aboard her. The 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


US 

natives had never heard a cannon before, evidently. 
She let out sheet and hung in the wind. A tall black, 
with a brimless straw hat atop his frizzled mop of hair, 
stood up on her shroud windlass and held up his left 
hand. 

“Hai! White man! — Goddy-goddy! You Cap’n 
Sloa’ ?” he called out amazedly, recognizing the Cap’n 
finally as the two ships drifted nearer. “How dam’ 
pearl fishin’ ?” he asked, conciliatorily, by way of pass- 
ing the time of day. 

“Hello, Yow-uta! What you mean by bearin' down 
on us like a bag o' hammers, eh?” chided Cap’n Sloan. 
“Had to make a leetle gun-talk, we did ! Got any pearls 
to sell, Chief — an’ no questions asked?” he inquired 
bluffly. 

Chief Yow-uta grinned, his evil visage screwed up 
in a crafty smile. “Yea. Me got’m prenty pearl- 
shell,” he answered in the universal pidgin-English. 

“Don't want it!” replied the Cap’n shortly. “How 
about the leetle round boys, eh? You got 'em — don't 
tell me!” 

The Chief grinned oilily. “P’rhaps,” he admitted 
slyly. 

“Awright. I’ll anchor up here a piece. You bring 
'em aboard, Chief, an’ we’ll do a bit of business, eh? 
I’ll be here three days.” 

“Going, sar!” wailed the Chief, in the singsong 


ii6 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

tones imitated from Chinese traders. “Will come 
soon.” 

He put the lakatoi about and stood off up the lagoon 
toward his village. 

“Now, son — we got ’em!” declared the Cap’n. 
“That old bird’ll come aboard and try to sell us our 
own pearls, by heck ! He has no idea where the Java- 
nese got ’em. Now, the thing for you to do is to get 
ashore and cut out that Javanese, if he’s still here. 
Bring him out, alive and hearty, and when the right 
time comes, we’ll produce him as witness, and jest 
annex our pearls. We’ll heave the chief overboard if 
he makes any fuss about it — hey ? Some scheme, son,” 
he chortled. 

“Has its good points,” admitted George. “How 
about the Javanese telling him just what you look like, 
and then he’s wise to the whole idea?” 

“That’s jest what we got to prevent! If he’s still 
there, you can git him. The chances are, the old deevil 
took the pearls away from him and then either ate the 
poor sailorman or has got him cooped up somewhere 
to fatten him up. With this light breeze, you can beat 
the lakatoi to the village, goin’ through the jungle. 
But, mind you take care of yourself ! It’s a much more 
dangerous piece of business than anything you’ve tried 
yet.” 

George was off like a shot, with the desired permis- 
sion, before the Cap’n could change his mind. Migi 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


ii 7 


belted on his quiver of poisoned sumpitan darts, 
grasped his long blowgun, and was ready. Slipping 
over the side, they swam ashore and were soon through 
the belt of mangroves and into the jungle. It was 
rank and dense and full of thorns, but the tree growth 
was nowhere near as immense as in the moist jungles 
of Borneo, up under the equator. They soon struck 
a trail that paralleled the shores, and so made good 
time. No outlying scouts were encountered, as most 
of the warriors were up at the village, news of the 
white boat having brought them in, probably for an 
attack in force. 

After a time the sound of children’s voices and the 
grunts of pigs in the jungle told them they were near- 
ing the village. They left the trail and sank deep into 
the undergrowth. Watching from a vantage point in 
the thick tree-ferns, they saw that it was a collection 
of low attap huts, built on short piles, the bamboo 
rafters curved over a central ridge pole. Pigs, fowl, 
dogs, tame kangaroos and goats wandered at will about 
the sandy grounds, while naked black women in palm 
fiber aprons went about their household tasks. Down 
by the landing the men were gathered, chattering in a 
Papuan dialect around the long black canoes hauled up 
on shore. The lakatoi still lay some distance down 
the lagoon, almost becalmed under the hot tropical 
sun. 

They circled the village through the jungle. The 


n8 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


Javanese was nowhere in sight, neither among the men 
around the canoes nor anywhere in the village. 

“That’s bad!” whispered George to Migi. “Either 
he’s gone, or they’ve eaten him, or he’s a prisoner in 
some hut. We’ll have to get into the village, some- 
how.” 

“Keep him in strong house. Must be,” declared 
the Dyak boy. 

“Sure! There’s a sort of stockaded hut, yonder, 
built of strong palings. See it? Right back of that 
great hut, which is the chief’s, I suppose.” 

How to get into the village in broad daylight, unde- 
tected, was something of a problem. It solved itself, 
however, presently, for a yelling and excitement among 
the warriors down at the landing over the arrival of 
the lakatoi brought every woman, child and dog run- 
ning pell-mell down to the canoes. 

“Now’s our chance, Migi — we gotta make it quick 
and snappy !” 

They dashed for the paling of the stockaded hut and 
peered into the gloom inside. There sat the Javanese 
sailor, chained securely to a post with a shackle around 
his ankle! He could not come near the wall, but was 
otherwise free to move about. He was fat as butter, 
George noted. 

“Men coming — run!” whispered Migi in his ear. 

They backed away hastily, keeping the hut between 
them and the landing, and so regained the jungle. 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


119 

“Now we are all balled up !” exclaimed George bit- 
terly. “Old Yow-uta’s sure to come and question the 
Javanese, and then he knows father’s whole scheme. 
If we’d only gotten him away, the old boy would have 
hustled out to sell us our pearls before the Javanese 
could get out to tell his side of the story. Gosh, if I 
know what to do !” 

“Wait,” advised Migi. “Mebbe we see where dem 
pearls at” 

That would be the key of the situation! If they 
could get hold of them, the Javanese and the chief did 
not matter. As they watched, the noise down at the 
landing ceased, and deep-chested orders from Yow-uta 
formed the men into some sort of war party. With- 
out further delay they started off in single file, march- 
ing up past the village huts, and their leaders entered 
the jungle by the same trail that the boys had just 
come along. George shook with excitement as he 
watched them breathlessly, his heart-beats sounding 
in his open mouth. Evidently an attack was being 
planned on the Midget Steamer herself! A surprise 
attack, at night, of course ! George could picture them, 
swimming silently out in the dead of night, creeping 
aboard, and then suddenly storming forecastle and 
after quarters simultaneously. Of what avail would 
their cannon and rifles be then? 

These natives were different and more ferocious sav- 
ages than any he had yet seen. The Papuans of 


120 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


British New Guinea are more or less semi-civilized, 
efficiently policed. But these, of totally unexplored 
Dutch territory, were as wild and cannibalistic as ever 
were their forebears before the first white ship sailed 
along their coasts. Each warrior was hideously 
streaked with white clay, and wore the ivory tusks 
of the wild boar through his nostrils, thus giving him 
a particularly fierce aspect. Some of them carried long 
war clubs, the handle of iron-wood and the head a 
thick, sharpened disc of jade. Others were armed 
with bows and spears ; and all carried long oval shields, 
white in color, with diabolical faces carved on them 
in scrolls of red cinnabar paint. 

As the last of the war party disappeared into the 
jungle, George was more than worried. Their posi- 
tion was now one of extreme peril. Separated, he and 
Migi could now only regain the steamer by canoe, and 
the Cap’n was practically alone on her, for none of the 
Dyaks could handle the one-pounder. Only one thing 
was favorable: the Cap’n would not sleep until they 
returned. He could not be surprised that way. 

Meanwhile, how to get back to their ship? George 
puzzled over it, thinking hard. A guard of old men 
and youths hung around the canoe landing. As for 
the pearls, they might be on Chief Yow himself. 
Would he leave such possessions in his hut? 

Suddenly George jumped with fright as a new 
danger presented itself. Their own tracks! Surely 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


121 


those white man’s shoes of his had left a print, some- 
where along their trail! The war party would come 
upon it, pointing toward their village, and at least a 
detail would be detached to track them to their pres- 
ent lair! 

“Aligi, we gotta do something about all this, mighty 
sudden pronto !” whispered Gfeorge anxiously, telling 
him his thought of their being tracked. “Won’t do 
for us to be found here, and get ambushed in the 
jungle. That was a regular kid mistake we made! 
Old Chief Yow’s got us, both ways!” 

A woman came bearing a bowl of food to the Java- 
nese’s prison at that moment, and it gave him his cue. 

“Quick, Migi! — after her!” 

They raced to the stockaded hut, ran around to its 
door and dashed inside. The old woman dropped her 
bowl and opened her mouth to yell, but Migi throttled 
her and after a brief, ineffectual struggle she lay bound 
on the floor of the hut. The Javanese recognized 
George with a grunt of surprise, and crawled to him 
abjectly, expecting at least to be killed for his sins at 
once. 

But George had no time for him, just then. Spying 
a pile of logs against the back of the chief’s hut, he 
ran out and dragged one in, shutting the hut door 
before any one noticed him. Using it as a ram, he 
and Migi broke the great stake that held the Javanese, 
and he was free except for the encumbrance of the 


122 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


chain. The stake, however, would make a service- 
able club, George observed, as the Javanese picked it 
up, mumbling his thanks. 

“No kai-kai you-fellah this time!” grinned George 
at him. “Where are our pearls ?” 

The Javanese looked at them, astonished, eyeing 
Migi’s kriss and George’s automatic fearfully. That 
the pearls could have belonged to the Sloans did not 
seem to penetrate. 

“Me find’m pearl in cocoanut tree, yes. B’long you- 
fellah, no?” he inquired, perplexedly. 

“0/ course they were ours !” reported George heat- 
edly. “Where are they now? — that’s what I want to 
know! You tell the truth — see!” he gritted, laying his 
hand on the pistol holster. 

“Chief got’m!” wailed the Javanese, with a despair- 
ing gesture. “Him take’m, prenty. Say will eat. 
Look !” he cried, pointing at his fat sides, lugubriously. 

The boys burst out laughing. “Well,” said George, 
“we’ll get ’em back before we’re through! This place 
will be our fort, for the present. We’ll barricade the 
door with that log, Migi.” They dug a heel for it 
and braced its stout end against the palings of the door. 
Then they fell to on the bowl of food, for both were 
ravenous. 

The villagers had now gone about their usual occu- 
pations, the women weaving mats or making sago 
bread, the old men squatting in groups, chewing betel 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


123 


nut and talking, and the youths lounging about the 
canoes. No one came near the hut ; it was an old story 
with them, and the prisoner no longer excited any 
interest. 

This inaction soon got on George’s nerves. How 
soon would the trackers from the war party get back ? 
It was also essential to regain the Midget Steamer 
soon, for the Outanatas might plan some way to board 
her in broad daylight, unless he could somehow warn 
the Cap’n. Then an idea occurred to him. Why not 
set fire to the chief’s hut? If the pearls were there, 
the old men would dash in to get them and any other 
loot out, the first thing, and they themselves could make 
a run for the canoes in the smoke and excitement. 
Three men, with a fixed purpose in mind, were equal to 
any mob, he well knew. 

“Help me open this door, Migi — and stand by !” he 
whispered, having formed his resolution. They got 
the beam away, and George watched his opportunity 
to squirm out, crawl across the alleyway, and hide in 
the pile of logs against the back of the chief’s hut. As 
he felt for a match, the boy’s heart pounded with 
excitement. He was starting something, with a ven- 
geance! If all went well, it would be a triumphant 
finish and would perhaps recover their pearls ; but, for 
better or worse 

“Here goes !” he muttered, as he lit the match and 
touched it to the thatch of dry palm attap. 


124 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

The flame spread up in a broad sheet as he dashed 
back inside their own hut. Smoke arose in a cloud; 
then came the shrill alarm of a woman’s screech and 
the excited shouts of the youths and old men. They 
were coming ! He and Migi barricaded the door and 
watched through the palings. Natives crowded in 
the alley, beating at the flames and hurling gourds 
of water. In vain! The hut soon became a roaring 
furnace. Youths dashed out of it carrying weapons 
and household furniture, and then a group of old men 
appeared, some bearing totems and fetishes, while 
two of them dragged an old sea-chest, probably cap- 
tured from some schooner whose crew had been mur- 
dered. George’s eyes blazed with excitement as he 
watched them. 

“Now, Migi!” he hissed, “get that chest, and we’ll 
make for the canoes !” They threw aside the log and 
opened the door. Migi paused a moment to shoot a 
dart at one of the chest haulers, and then George 
dashed out through the smoke, firing his automatic 
as he ran. Their sudden charge threw the village into 
the wildest confusion. Women and children ran 
squealing for the jungle, while the men raced hither 
and yon for weapons. Straight for the chest sprinted 
George, he and Migi firing right and left, while the 
Javanese wielded his stake with telling effect. Before 
the bewildered savages had gathered their wits, Migi 
had swung the chest upon his muscular back, and, 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


125 


bending low under his heavy burden, scuttled for the 
canoes, George and the Javanese covering his rear. 
They dumped the chest in the bottom of the nearest 
canoe and shoved off. 

Out in the lagoon they spied the Midget Steamer 
lying at anchor about a mile below the village, her 
glistening gun trained right at them. George and 
Migi and the Javanese paddled for dear life, but they 
made slow headway. Three canoes put off after them 
from the landing, filled with yelling youths and screech- 
ing old warriors. They closed up the distance swiftly, 
and soon arrows whistled overhead. One stuck in the 
thwart a hand's breadth from George’s back. It was 
of cane, a yard long, without feathers and with a long, 
toothed ebony point. 

Then they saw the Cap’n race aft to the one-pounder 
and a shell flew screaming over their heads and 
exploded among the pursuing canoes. It threw up a 
geyser that swamped one of them, but the other two 
came on, and George stopped paddling to fire back 
with his automatic. At the same time diabolical yells 
burst out from the jungle alongshore, and the war 
party of Outanatas sprang out through the fringe of 
mangroves and leaped splashing out through the shal- 
low water toward the Midget Steamer. Soon they 
began swimming swiftly, an attack in force on the 
Cap’n and his Dyaks, who were firing at them with 
their long sumpitans. The Cap’n, however, paid them 


126 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


no attention, so eager was he to help George. The gun 
barked, and a second shell flew over their heads as an 
arrow came singing aboard. It pierced the Javanese 
through the shoulders and he fell forward with a deep 
groan. The Outanata warriors were now closing in 
on the steamer, their heads bobbing like cocoanuts as 
they treaded water to shoot their bows ; but the Cap’n 
did not swerve his gun on them, aiming it fixedly for 
a shot at George’s pursuers. Here was the real dan- 
ger, for George and Migi were no match for the two 
canoes of savages that were swooping down on them. 
They stopped paddling and began to shoot with sum- 
pitan and automatic. Then the shell came whining 
overhead and exploded with a frightful crash full into 
the canoe astern to port. She blew up like a match box 
and her survivors were thrown headlong into the 
river. The other one sheered off at the hot fire that 
George and Migi kept up. 

The danger center of the fight now shifted to the 
steamer. Heads swarmed around her in the water; 
shields lifted up like great flat clamshells; long black 
arms, gripping spears, shot up her sides, while the 
Dyaks aboard hacked busily with their parangs. 
Suddenly the Cap’n stooped, and George felt, with a 
gripping at his heart, that he was hit. But he rose, 
put a short white cylinder to the cigar in his teeth, 
and cast it among the boarding party. There was a 
stunning report, a vast geyser of water that rocked the 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


127 

Mauie wildly, and the hurtle of black bodies driven 
headlong through the spray. 

The Outanatas re-formed, yelling defiance, climbed 
aboard on all sides and a fell fight on deck ensued. 
The Cap’n charged, wielding a flashing cutlass — the 
same cutlass that had scuttled the devil-fish on Ke’ — 
and laid about him at the head of his Dyaks, the 
Outanatas, who outnumbered him two to one, guarding 
themselves with their shields and prodding at him 
with their spears. 

“Gee, we’ve just got to get into that, somehow!” 
gritted George. “They’ll kill father before my very 
eyes!” He crouched below the gunwale, jamming in 
a fresh clip of cartridges, his eyes measuring the dis- 
tance to the gunboat, still nearly a quarter of a mile. 

“I wonder how far this automatic will carry,” he 
muttered. He rested the weapon across the gunwale, 
sighting high. The canoe behind them was shooting 
arrows, afraid to come to close quarters. Migi was 
replying with his deadly sumpitan darts, their ownl 
canoe drifting idly on the still waters. It was an ideal 
condition for a long shot. George pulled trigger and 
his bullet threw up a white streak directly in front of 
her side. Raising the sights a trifle more, he fired 
again. This time no answering splash came, so, train- 
ing it carefully on the knot of savages that were press- 
ing back the Cap’n and his party along the waist, he 
fired a burst of shots. To his intense joy, the savages 


128 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


halted their charge, looking over at his canoe bewil- 
deredly. 

“Got the range all right !” whispered the boy to him- 
self eagerly. “Now, if I can only hold it!” He pulled 
trigger three times rapidly. Tumbling over one 
another the savages dropped back, looking over at 
their canoe, amazed at this unexpected diversion. Like 
a flash the Cap’n raced back to the gun, swung it and 
fired point blank into them. The horizontal red flash 
from its muzzle, the rolling cloud of smoke and the 
sharp, spanking report made a vivid scene, forever to 
be etched in the boy’s memory. Through the drift of 
smoke he could see the savages leaping helter-skelter 
into the lagoon and making for the shore. Then the 
gun swung out to them once more, and a shell came 
ripping and whining, hungry for the remaining canoe 
astern. It buzzed close overhead, ricocheted, and 
exploded half-way back to the village landing. At 
sight of this mysterious danger, far in their rear, the 
savages in her spun her around and fled. They had 
had enough of these white men ! 

George and Migi resumed their paddles and soon 
bore down on the Mauie. 

“Hosts of Jehovah!” roared the Cap’n at them 
jubilantly. “We jest ruined that passel of pirates! 
Them bullets of youm come in mighty handy, son! 
They’d about hed us, I dunno ! What ye got there ?” 


THE MIDGET STEAMER 


129 

he called, perceiving the chest in the bottom of the 

canoe. 

“Did they hurt you any, father ?” called out George, 
anxiously. 

“Nope. Nothin’ but a couple of scratches and a 
bruise or two from them war clubs,” growled the 
Cap’n sturdily. “But we ain’t got our pearls back, 
son. I’ve got that old deevil, Yow-uta, here; dead as 
a mackerel, he is, — but there ain’t a thing on him but 
a loin cloth, some hair scalps, and some white paint. 
Where’d ye git that chist ?” 

“Just an idea of mine!” laughed George. “People 
usually go for their valuables when there is a fire, so 
I started one — in the chief’s house. Looks like the 
old fellow’s strong box to me !” 

“Ye don’t say! Git her up here and we’ll open it!” 
barked the Cap’n excitedly. They swung it over the 
rail and an ax was brought. Inside, all the loot from 
a dozen trading schooners came to view: sextants, 
chronometers, compasses, gold watches, jewelry, gold 
and silver pieces from a dozen nations — and, in a 
compartment of its own, two small bags of pearls ! 

“These is ourn, all right!” chortled the Cap’n, open- 
ing one of them. “As for the rest of this plunder, we’ll 
turn it over to the Governor at Amboina. Want to go 
home now, son?” chuckled Captain Sloan, poking 
George in the ribs facetiously. 

“Not with this good packet under us, dad! The 


130 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

East’s got me, I’ll tell the world ! Le’s send for mother 
to come out here. We have everything, now, — friends, 
coal, and a good ship! What more could any one 
want?” 

“Up anchor, lads!” ordered the Cap’n suddenly. 
“Every village on the lagoon will be after us soon. 
This place seems kinder unhealthy to me — now that 
we got back our pearls. Amboina next !” 


CHAPTER VI 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 

Cap’n John Sloan had been ashore three days in 
Amboina, the capital of Ceram in the Moluccas, the 
Spice Isles of the East. George awaited the Cap’n’ s 
return with increasing expectancy, for he knew his 
father was planning a big change in their lives, and 
his curiosity as to what that change would be grew 
and grew until he could think of nothing else. He 
knew that the Cap’n was done with pearling for good; 
that their old pearl schooner days on the Kawani , 
diving and tending air pumps — a prosaic, toilsome and 
sweltering business down on the Fisheries — were over. 
George and Migi, his Dyak boy chum, were idling out 
the hot days under the awning of the Sloan’s little 
steamer, the Mauie, awaiting the Cap’n’s coming 
while she swung at anchor, seemingly suspended in 
mid-air over the boundless forests of purple and 
orange coral beds forty feet beneath them in the crys- 
tal depths of Amboina Bay. 

Migi had the art of idling developed to a science. 
All he cared for was hunting, with fishing, perhaps, 


132 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

as an infrequent side line. Aboard ship he would play 
chess by the day at a time; if George tired of this, even 
doing tricks with a string suited him. Anything, so 
long as it was a game! Back in Borneo, where they 
had captured the Mauie from a renegade crew of opium 
smugglers, George and Migi had spent most of their 
time hunting in the jungle near Long House, where 
Datu Bulieng, Migi’s father, ruled as the Datu of a 
small Dyak principality. George loved the tropic 
jungle, too; its grand columnar trees, hung with 
llianas that climbed to the uppermost branches under 
the green foliage, its savage beasts and troops of 
monkeys, its gorgeous blue and green butterflies, its 
stunningly-colored, vivid-hued tropical birds, its air 
of silence and mystery, all called to the hunting ardor 
in him. Both he and Migi hoped that the Captain’s 
next move would take him where some enterprise of 
mining or animal collecting would lead them back 
again to the jungle that they both loved. 

On the morning of the third day a small boat put 
out from the old Portuguese quay that fronted the 
palace and the government buildings of the Dutch 
Residency. George reached for his glasses and trained 
them on it eagerly. 

“Here he comes, now, Migi!” he cried. “That’s 
father, in the stem — I’d know that white officer’s coat 
and visored cap of his anywhere! And the fellow in 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 133 

the red turban rowing is Kubing, our serang. Now 
we’ll know something V’ 

Migi grinned broadly under hi9 bang of blue-black 
hair, and his merry brown eyes, almond-shaped yet 
straight set across his small, delicate Malay nose, 
danced with excitement. 

“Cap’n Sloan, him go blakang tana (jungle ) — sahya 
fikir (I think),” he grinned, mixing up Malay and 
pidgin-English in his usual glorious verbal jumble. 

“What makes you think he is going into the jungle, 
Migi?” laughed George, indulgently, at the young 
Dyak. 

“Sahya fikir ! — I flunk so!” quoth Migi sententiously, 
and there you had the whole Malay philosophy in a 
nutshell ! 

“In other words, that’s your hunch, eh?” chuckled 
George. “I hope so, too. We’ll know pretty soon.” 

The gig neared the Midget Steamer, with the Cap’n 
bellowing out news while he was yet a cable length 
off. “I sold our pearls, son!” his voice shouted across 
the glassy water. “Got twenty thousand for ’em! 
Banked it, and cabled your mother to come out East! 
She’ll be here in ’bout three months. Sa-ay! Hosts 
of Pharaoh, son, but we’ve landed a bully commis- 
sion !” he yelled. “Tell you all about it when we get 
alongside — give way on those oars, lad!” he wheezed 
at Kubing, running too much out of breath to call any 
more news. 


134 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

Presently the gig shot alongside, and in a trice the 
Cap’n had climbed the side ladder and stumped aboard. 
“Warm up the engine, boys — we’re going to Suma- 
tra!” he announced, greeting George and Migi. “You 
know His Imperial Nibs, the Sultan of Tidore, son?” 
he inquired, grinning broadly through the tropic tan 
that had pickled his face to the color of a beet. 

George nodded, smiling delightedly, for he felt that 
something good and exciting was coming. 

“Well, it seems I’ve made a hit with the Sultan. 
He insists I’m jest the man for him in the animal 
collecting line, and he’s tired of dealing with old 
Mohamet Ariff up at Singapore — and getting cheated 
— so, when I called on him at his palace back in the 
hills he was all for us going to Sumatra for him. He 
wants a black leopard, dead or alive; a python alive, 
the biggest one we can find ; a clouded leopard and a 
whole consignment of monkeys for his menagerie. 
Money’s no object — we can send in our bill and he’ll 
foot it. Like that, son?” queried the Cap’n face- 
tiously, digging George in the ribs with a pudgy 
thumb. 

“Oh — lead us to it!” gasped George. “C’mon, 
Migi, what are we standing here for? — We’ll have the 
engine ready in half an hour, dad! And what’s this 
about mother coming out — whoops !” he yelled, beside 
himself with joy. 

“Yep. She’s coming here instead of us v’yaging 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 135 

back home. She leaves New York February tenth. 
That’ll get her to Colombo ’bout April, and then she 
takes a Dutch steamer to Batavia, where we meet her 
with the Mauie. She’ll get here jest about the opening 
of the dry season, and meanwhile we’ll clean up this 
Sumatra business,” rumbled the Cap’n, mopping his 
face with a blue bandanna. 

George and Migi swarmed below to warm up the 
engine, while the Cap’n and the serang set about heav- 
ing up the anchor short. Migi unbanked the boiler 
fires. George opened the steam drains, started up his 
condenser pumps, and let live steam come screeching 
through the by-passes into the cylinders of the Mauie' s 
hundred-horsepower compound engine. Presently he 
turned her over, slowly, back and forth a few times, 
and then, at the ready bell, the anchor was broken out 
and the Mauie got under way and stood out of the 
coral-bottomed harbor of Amboina. 

From there to Palembang in Sumatra is a cool 
seventeen hundred miles, but the fast little Mauie did 
it in six days ; through the Buotong Passage and across 
the Java Sea, due west, arriving at Banca Straits on 
the evening of the fifth day. 

Palembang is a hundred miles up the river from the 
coast. Imagine a wide bend of three miles of river, 
crowded along both banks with bamboo houses on 
piles and floats out in the stream, where one goes to 
market in a canoe (for the shops are a long distance 


136 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

out from shore) and you have the Malay town of 
Palembang. The Marne anchored out in midstream, 
with dozens of proas and junks swinging to the cur- 
rent above and below her. George and Migi now 
almost lived in the ship’s gig, exploring the water lanes 
and canals along the shop fronts, buying ship stores, 
and every other day or so taking the Captain up to 
visit an old hadji who lived back in the flooded jungle 
above the town. This old fellow was in constant touch 
with the tribesmen, the Orang Ulu of the interior, who 
advised their hadji by runners whenever a tiger, 
leopard, rhino or any wild beast whatever of interest 
to the menagerie world would be reported by any of 
the villagers. 

After some ten days of waiting and endless pow- 
wows in floods of voluble Malay chatter, a native came 
alongside the Mauie one morning with word from the 
hadji that a black leopard had been located far up in 
the mountains in the interior. He was a cattle stealer 
and a man-eater, and had evidently been driven out of 
some district to the west still ruled over by native 
princes and therefore swarming with wild beasts. 

“Jerusha’s Cats, son!” exploded the Cap’n, when 
he had finally gotten the matter straight out of the 
tangle of talk and exaggeration which constituted the 
Malay’s message. “There’s luck for ye! A black 
leopard ain’t yanked out of every passel of jungle! 
We’ll go right up-river to-day! Start loading our 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 137 

stores and camp outfit in the gig, son, while I break 
out our rifles and ammunition.” 

He stumped back to the cuddy. George and Migi 
and two of the Dyaks packed up food, bedding mats, 
a tent and cooking paraphernalia, and stowed them 
in the gig. The Cap'n had meanwhile shifted into 
khaki hunting gear and now came out on deck with 
a heavy rifle for himself and George in each hand 
and canvas belts of cartridges hung over his arm. 
Migi fetched his long iron-wood sumpitan and laid 
it carefully in the bow sheets of the gig. With its 
bamboo quiver of poisoned darts and its heavy spear 
blade lashed to the muzzle of the blowgun like a bayo- 
net, he felt himself better armed for the jungle than 
with any white man's gun. A parangdhlang, the Dyak 
war sword, and the inevitable kriss stuck in his belt 
completed his armament. For outfit he carried a 
cadjan or square mat slung in a tight roll on his back. 
This was house, blanket and mattress in one to him ; 
also an umbrella, for it had a pocket sewed across one 
comer so that he could wear the thing like a peak over 
his head when it rained. 

The Cap’n unfurled the gig's sail and they shoved 
off. She swept upstream, and they were joined 
shortly after by the long log canoe of the hadji, who 
with his son joined their expedition above Palembang. 
Two days of alternate rowing and sailing around 
bends and up reaches brought them to the foothills of 


138 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

the mountains, where the river became too swift for 
the gig to navigate further. There they stopped and 
beached her, near a trail which came down to the land- 
ing, and here was a Sumatran village of queer peaky 
huts, a jumble of pointed gables all curved up like 
the eaves of pagodas. Every foot of their wooden 
walls and posts was covered with elaborate carvings; 
the huts resembled ornamental corn cribs more than 
any other white man’s structure, for their roofs far 
overhung the body of the houses and their walls sloped 
outward from the ground up. 

Past the village the road inland to the mountains 
wound through irregular clearings, with wild banana 
trees growing in clumps by the roadside and stately 
palms rising amongst the huts. News of their landing 
went out into the back country like wildfire and crowds 
of natives came in to stare and jabber in a Sumatran 
dialect that was scarce Malay. After a whole evening 
of talk between the hadji and the village chief, a guide 
was engaged to go with them at dawn to where the 
black leopard had been marked down in the mountain 
fastnesses. 

Next morning, after a short march along the state 
road, their native branched off into a narrow trail that 
plunged immediately under the vast leafy arches of the 
high forest. 

“My stars!” ejaculated the Cap’n, mopping his brow 
as he peered about him through the hot, shady depths 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 139 

of the jungle. “This is the real thing, boys! You 
gotta keep your eyes right smart peeled and shoot 
quick and sudden in here! There’s not much for us 
to fear from tigers in the daytime. Old Stripes always 
slinks out of sight till nightfall; but Spots, he’ll stand 
his ground and fight, every time!” 

“But isn’t the leopard considerably smaller than the 
tiger, dad?” objected George. “He can’t do much 
against such rifles as these !” he declared, looking con- 
fidently down at the heavy .35 Winchester lying in the 
crook of his arm. 

“ ’Tain’t that, son; it’s the habits of the creeter and 
his strength and omeryness. You’ll find him, layin’ 
for what comes along the trail, high up on some great 
tree limb — and he don’t care whether it’s man or deer 
that he springs for, either! Hev ye any idee of a leop- 
ard’s strength? Well, I’ll tell ye,” quoth the Cap’n 
oracularly, waving his free arm about. “This hap- 
pened once, at an animal show in Singapore, ’twas, 
and I saw it. There was a spotted kitty in that show, 
and her trick was to leap twenty feet and land on a big 
iron ball that hung by a chain. Welp — she missed it, 
the time I saw her — and, Sword of Jehoshaphat, but 
didn’t she flare up hot as pepper, right sudden quick! 
Like a flash of light she hit that iron ball a crack with 
her paw and it broke the chain and druv the ball clear 
across the cage, where it bent the iron bars! Don’t 
talk to me ! — you watch these trees overhead mighty 


i 4 o THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

careful as we go along, boys!” snorted the Cap’n 
implacably, leading on with his heavy .50-110 express 
rifle poised in both hands for instant shooting. 

The party moved silently along in single file. Pres- 
ently a shrill squalling broke out ahead of them. It 
seemed to come from a little to one side in the depths 
of the jungle. 

“ Munyeet ! (Monkey!)” yelled the Malay guide, 
springing into the underbrush. The squalling grew 
louder and changed to short barks as the monkey per- 
ceived the man coming for him. George and Migi ran 
in to where the small simian insurrection was going on, 
and then laughed until their sides ached, for, lashed 
to the trunk of a tree was an ordinary blue bottle 
covered with pandanus leaves and a large monkey had 
his paw in it and was hopping up and down tugging at 
it frantically, squalling at them with ludicrous rage. 

‘There’s the funniest trap ever invented, boys!” 
heehawed the Cap’n as they watched the angry mon- 
key. “All there is to it is a little sugar-water and a 
ball of rag inside that bottle. The monkey put in his 
paw to grab the rag, and now he hasn’t sense enough 
to let go of it and get his paw out — did you ever!” 

Without more ado the native seized the monkey by 
the nape of his neck, and then with finger and thumb 
pinched his elbow, forcing his fingers to release the 
rag ball. He then pulled Mr. Monkey away from the 
bottle, gagged his jaws with a stick, trussed him up, 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 141 

and with the captive hanging over a stick they set 
forth along the trail again. 

The going got wilder and wilder as they climbed up 
into the mountain ravines. After a long silent march, 
away off to the left in the jungle came a distant squeal- 
ing and trumpeting. 

“Hist!” exclaimed Captain John, as they all stopped 
to listen. “Marsh elephants!” he declared. “Too 
small to be worth capturing, compared to those of 
India and Siam, so they’re let alone by ’most every- 
body ” 

“Haie!” interrupted Migi with a sudden yell. He 
cast his spear aloft, and at the same instant George’s 
rifle sprang to shoulder and crashed out up into the 
foliage. A ferocious snarl, a spitting and coughing 
sounded above them. Then the air seemed filled with 
flying claws and paws striking out, as a large cat-like 
animal fell, its head, with ears flattened and teeth bared 
in a hideous wrinkle, snarling at them with diabolical, 
murderous intent. 

“Look out l!” shouted the Cap’n, springing to one 
side. His heavy express roared out and a howl of 
rage answered it as the leopard bounded down among 
them where they had all just stood. Migi’s spear still 
stuck in his right flank ; George and his father leaped 
back, covering him with their rifle muzzles ready to 
fire again. But the big express bullet had scuppered 
him. They watched the wild ferocity die out in the 


142 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

green eyeballs, as with a convulsive leap the leopard 
fell over on his side and lay gasping. No one spoke for 
a moment ; they all stood breathing heavily with shock 
and surprise. 

“Sent from heaven!” chortled the Cap’n at length, 
finding his voice and his good humor at the same 
instant in the relief of the moment. “No one hurt? 
— Hosts of Pharaoh, boys, it’s a clouded leopard ! And 
he was up there watching us all the time we were lis- 
tening to those elephants! Good eye, and good spear 
shot, Migi!” he laughed, gripping the Dyak boy’s 
brown hand warmly. “You saved us all that time!” 

“Me see um! Jump! Shoot spear!” grinned Migi. 
“Gun, him go-bang! All kill!” he laughed uproar- 
iously. 

They examined the savage little leopard curiously. 
Beautifully marked, his fur was clouded like a tortoise- 
shell tabby’s — an exceedingly rare species. Smaller 
than the ordinary spotted leopard, he had nevertheless 
the same dangerous instincts of lying in wait up trees 
and springing upon whatever might pass beneath. 

The hadji and his son now climbed down out of the 
trees in which they had taken refuge and set about 
skinning out the pelt. 

“I guess we’d better halt for a rest, now, endurin’ 
the heat of the day,” remarked the Cap’n watching 
them. “This kitten’ll do for a starter. The jungle’s 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 143 

gettin’ mighty hot and moist, and it won’t do to move 
about much, now, until the cool of the evening.” 

The party slung their hammocks and spread out 
their mat cadjans for a noon-day siesta. Until after 
four it would be foolhardy to attempt any further 
march, for the thermometer was due to climb to 125 
degrees in another hour — and stay there! 

Along about five o’clock they took up the march 
again and stopped for the night about five miles far- 
ther on, up at a little plateau on the mountain flank, 
where it was cool and a noisy brook rippled around a 
bend. Here the tent was pitched, a fire started, and 
the natives spread their mats out under a fly with 
mosquito bar hanging down all around its edges. The 
hadji explained that about a mile above here was a 
water hole where most of the jungle folk came down 
to drink and bathe. It was decided to kill a deer and 
stake out the carcass at the edge of the water hole. 
Watching it at night, they could await the coming of 
the black leopard, for this region, the hadji declared, 
was his present hunting ground. At dusk they went 
up to reconnoiter the spot. 

'These black ones are larger and more ferocious 
than the ordinary spotted kind, boys — and besides, 
there might be a tiger around,” quoth the Cap’n, look- 
ing over the ground. "We don’t want to be in any 
ground hide, in such case, or we’re likely to get nabbed 


144 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

from behind ! Up that little thorn tree will be the place 
for us, I jedge.” 

He pointed out a stout thorn tree which grew on 
the jungle edge, commanding the pebbly beach of the 
water hole. Up it climbed Migi with his parang, and 
soon he had cleared a space in its depths and had begun 
a screen of the hacked off boughs. George and the 
harji cut bamboo poles for a platform and passed 
them up, and soon Migi had a serviceable “hide” 
ready for them. Then the natives returned to camp, 
leaving George and his father and Migi on watch. 

Darkness fell. The tropical stars came out, filling 
the heavens with a blaze of splendor, such starlight as 
we never see in our colder northern climates. Hardly 
had the gloom hid the details of the jungle, before 
night noises of animals coming down to drink filled the 
air. Troops of monkeys came first, jabbering and 
chattering and chasing one another all over the beach. 
After them there were little, half-heard rustlings, and 
what looked like moving turtles creeping across the 
pebbles — small rodents of every kind. As the party 
watched and listened, far off in the jungle sounded the 
hoarse, ropy caterwaul of the great hunting cats; 
once or twice, even, the long-drawn hunger call of Lord 
Tiger, out for his nightly foray. Then, through the 
darkness came heavy breathings of cattle, Sumatran 
wild bulls from the depths of the jungle. They waded 
in and drank deep, blowing from their moist noses like 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 145 

the sigh of bellows. After them the dainty thud of 
hoofs on loose stones betokened the arrival of deer, and 
now the Sloans cocked their rifle hammers noiselessly, 
for with them would come the carnivorous hunting 
cats, leopard or tiger, or both. 

All was now dead silence throughout the jungle; an 
ominous, foreboding silence which showed that They 
were about! The deer drank nervously, stopping just 
long enough for a plunge and a frightened leap back 
to the safety of the jungle. 

Suddenly a thunderous screech rent the silence of 
the night. The remnants of the deer herd scattered 
with a frantic scramble of hoofs. There was an ago- 
nized bleat and the gurgle of some animal being sub- 
merged and drowned under water. The Sloans 
strained their eyes, striving to pierce the gloom, but 
they could see nothing. It was the black leopard 
himself, George was certain, black as the night — and 
as invisible ! The agitated surface of the pool danced 
with myriad stars reflected from its smooth, rolling 
wavelets. George peered and aimed his rifle — in vain ! 
Nothing that he dared pull trigger on appeared over 
the sights ! He raised his head and stared at the pool, 
eagerly, shivering with excitement, for he knew it 
would not be a moment more before the leopard would 
leap away with his prey in his teeth, like a cat carrying 
a mouse. Then his eyes made out — something! 
Among those myriad dancing points of starlight was 


146 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

a space where they did not show ! He aimed his rifle 
at the spot, but the faint vision was instantly lost in 
the blur of the sights. 

Then an inspiration, a grand idea, came whizzing 
into his mind. The leopard would rise, presently, and 
he would blot out those star reflections in the pool 
above him! Then would be the time to shoot! Care- 
fully picking a bright star glint above the dim black 
bulk that was the leopard’s form, George sighted on it* 
held steady — and waited. 

A thrill went through him like an electric shock — 
that star reflection had ceased shining ! Instantly 
George pulled trigger. Upon the crash of the rifle a 
deafening roar rang out. The dropped deer splashed 
back into the pool, and then something black and 
awful, without shape or form, charged swiftly toward 
their tree. The Cap’n’s express barked out its streak 
of flame, but It came on, vague and indistinguishable, 
but roaring vengefully below them. It would not be 
vague an instant longer, but striking for them with 
sledgehammer blows of paws armed with scimitar 
claws, George realized as he fired again, blindly, hoping 
to hit, but more than expecting to have to use the 
muzzle of his gun as a frantic prod to fend off the 
black terror. 

With a hideous snarl, paralyzing every nerve with 
freezing, animal fright, the leopard launched himself 
like a thunderbolt for their hide. A thick bough, 


A BLACK LEOPARD OF SUMATRA 147 

smashed aside like a straw, broke in front of them — 
and then Migi yelled out like a wild beast, driving his 
spear full into the throat of the hungry death striking 
at them with flying claws. The Cap’n’s express went 
off with a stunning crash at the same instant and the 
black leopard fell back, striking right and left at the 
branches around him. The tree shivered and shook 
under them; Migi pulled himself back out of the tangle 
of thorns where he had been driven by the impact of 
the spring. Then they all waited, hearts pounding so 
that they could hear the pulse beats through their open 
mouths, while, with a flurry and a grunt and a hoarse 
growl, savage to the last, the life went out down there 
in the jungle bushes below. 

“And that’s that!” exploded the Cap’n with a 
mighty surge of relief as they listened to make sure 
that the black leopard would strike no more. “How 
did you ever manage to hit him in the first place, son?” 
he inquired curiously. “I thought surely he would get 
away, as no one could see him a-tall.” 

“Oh, well,” laughed George nervously, “I just 
sighted on the reflection of a star in the pool, and when 
he rose and blotted it out, I knew it was him and let 
him have it. That was all !” 

“Right there with the pinch hit, son — as usual!” 
grunted the Cap’n admiringly. “Good work! And 
you, too, Migi — that spear of yours was the boy! 
Welp — the Sultan’s got his black kitten, all right!” 


CHAPTER VII 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 


“Good-by, Migi!” 

George gripped his Dyak boy chum’s hand strongly, 
and tears of emotion sprang to his eyes. He had been 
more than a chum, for to Migi George owed his very 
life. Their friendship had been strong and unbroken 
since that day when Migi had come into their camp 
on Ke\ Now the dull gold ring on his finger, set with 
a glowing ruby, proclaimed that the Dyak boy was no 
longer just Migi, but Datu Migi, for his father, Datu 
Bulieng, had sent a proa to Palembang with runners 
bearing this simple token. It signified that Migi was 
to return home and assume his share of governing the 
Dyak principality ruled over by Datu Bulieng. Across 
the Carimata Straits, by Biliton and Banca it had 
come, and the proa already was waiting for them at 
Palembang when they had returned to the Mauie from 
the highlands of Sumatra. 

“Good-by, Tuan George. Me never forget you!” 
said Migi huskily, shaking George’s hand for the last 
time after paying his adieus to the Cap’n. He could 
148 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 149 

scarce keep his eyes off the ring that told him that he 
was now a power in his own people, but this friend- 
ship with the Sloans had been sweet, crowded as it had 
been with those comradeships in danger and adventure 
that cement the love of man for man. Even now they 
could overhear the Cap’n telling a visitor the story 
of their last adventure together, the capture of the 
great python, where Migi had saved George’s life. 

The stranger was peering curiously at the huge 
creature, asleep in his bamboo crate on the deck of 
the Mauie. 

“My stars, man, but them pesky boys were right in 
the thick of it — you listen to me!” the Cap’n was tell- 
ing him, while a busy bandanna mopped the perspira- 
tion from his weather-beaten brow. “When we were 
up in Siak and had jest come back from a leopard hunt, 
in comes a runner to our old hadji tellin’ how a great 
python had et one of his pigs. I know the old boy 
would stay right there for a matter of three weeks or 
so, asleep and dygestin’ his pig, so we set about making 
this here crate. Then we wheeled it up-country, by 
bullocks, and carried it into the jungle. Hosts of 
Pharaoh, but here was one serpent, man dear ! 
Sleepin’ as peaceful as peaceful — so we crep’ up and 
slipped a noose over his neck and led it back through 
the door of the cage and out through the palin’s 
behind. Then we put two more ropes around his tail 
and led ’em out to trees near by. My idee was to haul 


150 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

on the neck rope, paying out on the tail ropes so as to 
keep him stretched out straight, where he couldn’t 
rassle none, an’ so ease him into the crate. 

“Welp! — the minute we begun on the neck rope, the 
old boy woke up ! See ? He jumped and doubled like a 
flash. Migi got a turn around a tree with his tail rope 
and hung fast, but the old hadji lost his nerve and 
dropped hisn. And then there was doin’ s!” exploded 
the Cap’n impressively. “That snake — twenty-eight 
feet long he was, an’ thick as a tree — he throsh around 
and knocked over a lot of the niggers, an’ the next I 
know he’d thrown a coil around George, who was tryin’ 
to herd ’em all out of danger. It was all done quick as 
a flash, ye know. There was George, helpless as a kit- 
ten — one good chance to constrict, and that python’d 
crush every bone in his body, with the blood spurtin’ 
out of mouth and nose and ears ! My soul ! I shoved 
my neck rope into a native’s hand and yelled to him to 
hang fast while I dashed for the snake. The old feller 
lunged back his head as I come, rippin’ another yard 
of rope through my native’s hands, and then I sprung 
for him, throwin’ my coat over his head. He threw 
me around like ye’ve seen a loose fire hose throw the 
men hangin’ to it — and then another coil of him loops 
around my George! It looks all up for him, to me, 
for I wasn’t doin’ any particular good, when here 
comes Migi, in one long leap from his tree. That 
Dyak lad knew jest what to do! He sunk his fingers 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 15 1 

into the python’s neck, jest back of his head — as he 
told us later — so as to paralyze the big spinal nerve 
temporarily. I felt the snake go slack and saw George 
pry himself out of the coils, while the niggers hauled 
away on their ropes and stretched him out straight. 
The snake had Migi’s arm in his mouth, but we pried 
his jaws open with a club and got him free. After that 
there was nothin’ to it. He slapped around somethin’ 
tremendous, but little by little we hauled his head into 
the crate, paying out tail rope foot by foot. Then 
George got a rope around his middle and we hauled 
that into the crate, and finally the tail, and then shet 
the door. Jerusha’s Cats, but the Sultan’ll be proud 
of that python ! It’s the biggest one in any menagerie 
in the world !” 

The stranger looked around curiously at the white 
bandage on Migi’s arm, as the Dyak lad got into the 
canoe that was waiting for him alongside. 

“Rather sporty chap, that, don’tyerknow !” he 
drawled. “I’d like to shake hands with him.” 

They all went over for a final farewell. George 
could hardly speak. 

“Good-by, Tuan George!” called Migi from the 
canoe. “Come to Long House, again, soon !” 

George thrilled. Tuan George! Only men, not 
boys, were called that! Involuntarily his hand went 
to his upper lip, where a thin fuzz told him that Nature 
was fast turning him into a Tuan, not an anak (child). 


152 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

The Cap’n laughed gru&ly as he turned from waving 
to Migi. 

“Tuan George, eh! Le’s see, son, how old are you 
gettin’ to be!” he exclaimed. “My stars, if you ain’t 
all of eighteen! You may well feel your upper lip, 
son! There’ll be a man’s work for you to do, soon, 
you mark me!” 

But George did not reply. His eyes were all on 
Migi. His chum was going, to assume the rule of part 
of a principality, a man’s work indeed. Their happy 
days of carefree adventures together were over. Might 
they meet again, often and often, during his wander- 
ings over the Archipelago ! 

He turned at length to rejoin the Cap’n and the 
stranger. 

“This is Ben Munby, George,” said the Cap’n, 
introducing him. “I’ve engaged him to help run the 
engine with you and take Migi’s place. And now get 
the engine ready and stand by, boys! We’ve got to 
make the run back to Amboina before any of these 
monkeys get a chance to die on our hands.” 

The Cap’n stumped forward to see about breaking 
out the anchor. George found himself with a com- 
fortable looking young English boy of a little more 
than his own age. He turned out to be a somewhat 
experienced marine engineer, having been the Third on 
some tramp steamer, and they got on well together. 
Soon the Mauie was under way, passing Migi’s proa 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 153 

drifting down the river. Again the two chums waved 
their farewells, and George went below with a sad 
heart, not inclined to make any advances, for the 
present, with young Munby. However, the English 
lad was undemonstrative and self-sufficient, after the 
manner of his breed the world over, and they made 
the trip with a slowly ripening friendship developing 
between them. 

Three days after their arrival at Amboina the 
Cap’n’s boat came out from the docks. Beside the 
Cap’n in the stern sheets of the gig sat a gorgeous 
creature, some under official from the Sultan’s retinue, 
most likely. George eyed him as the gig approached. 
Resplendent in a stunning turban of fiery red silk, 
a gorgeous jacket of iridescent yellows that a Gerome 
would have envied, a bright green silk sash with a 
couple of pearl-handled pistols stuck in it, this dark- 
skinned Mussulman, a man somewhat under middle 
age, seemed dressed for a part in the Arabian Nights. 

“Meet Suib, George,” grunted the Cap’n, as he and 
the Arab came over the rail and advanced smiling. 

The man of the turban salaamed reverently. 
“Greetings, Heaven-born!” he murmured, as George 
stepped up to shake hands. 

“Suib is one of the Sultan’s best shikaris (hunters), 
George,” explained the Cap’n. “I’ve been having a 
long talk with the old gentleman, these last few days, 
and he wants me to stay here awhile and undertake 


154 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

some rather delicate negotiations with the Dutch Resi- 
dent. So we have picked you, my boy, to go with Suib 
on a trip to one of the Sultan’s islands on the East 
Coast of New Guinea. Suib, here, speaks English 
and Malay, and also understands the dialects of these 
savage Pacific tribes. The island is called Wairibi, 
and is nominally under the Sultan’s rule. It’s too 
small for the Dutch to send a gunboat there, unless 
there is an insurrection or something, but there’s an 
uneasy rumor about — some sort of trouble brewing 
down there — and also we hear that paradise birds 
abound. How’d you like to go down there, in a native 
proa, and see what’s up, and try to get us a few para- 
dise birds?” 

“Glad to, father!” beamed George, smiling at Suib. 
He wanted to yell, “ Wheel” and caper about the deck, 
but could do no such thing in the presence of such a 
gorgeous court official as this Mohammedan ! 

They went to the cuddy aft to talk over details. 

“This may mean something more for you, son,” 
rumbled the Cap’n confidentially when they were once 
alone. “If you show tact and judgment, the Sultan 
may appoint you Rajah of that island, as the Dutch 
would be glad to have a white man in charge there. 
The people are barbarous savages, and the East Coast 
swarms with pirates from Jobie, New Caledonia and 
the like, so you may have a row or two. I’m almost 
afraid to let you go alone, but Land’s Cats, son, you 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 155 

might as well, though! You’re almost grown; many 
a young Assistant Resident is hardly more than your 
age, in these islands. There’s one white trader there, 
by the name of Kegley, but he’s too busy to go into 
the interior much, so you can’t count on him.” 

He handed George a small canvas pouch to go on his 
belt. 

“The white man’s mainstay, in a tight place, 
George,” chuckled the Cap’n, pointing out three small 
nickel cylinders inside. “These have three-second 
fuses. Touch ’em to your cigarette and throw ’em, if 
you have to. And here’s my .38 Officer’s Model. The 
best six-gun in the world. You may need it on this 
expedition! Never pick a fight with the natives, if it 
can possibly be avoided, but if you do have to fight, 
hand it to ’em strong! It’s the only way they can be 
taught to respect you — and us.” 

Three days later George, with Suib at his side, set 
out around Ceram in a large native proa. Their course 
lay through Bouro Strait, bound for Wairibi, a large 
island off the East Coast. Bottles dangled from the 
yardarms of the huge mat sails of the proa, while 
George stood on deck, practising the gunman’s throw 
— the revolver swung up from a leg holster — and with 
satisfying frequency one would smash to splinters as 
a shot went home. Ammunition was now no object to 
George ; it was up to him to learn quick shooting 
during the short time of his voyage. Neither were 


156 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

bottles, although each one would be worth much in 
trade with the Papuan savages of Wairibi. 

There are two ways of throwing a gun. In the 
ordinary throw, known to every cowman in the West, 
the gun swings up from the holster with thumb over 
hammer, and, when it is snapped down to horizontal, 
the hammer is released and the gun barks as it comes 
down on the mark. It looks effective, and always has 
seemed spectacular — to the tenderfoot — but there is 
just a split second of lost motion to it, so the real 
gunman passes it up. His way is to draw with thumb 
on hammer — the base not the ball of the thumb — and 
snap off as the gun comes up to horizontal — quick as 
lightning, and quite as accurate as the slower way. 
It takes lots of practice to get this throw down fine, 
and many a would-be gunman has shot off his own 
toes in learning it. 

Suib watched George’s practice morosely. It was 
none of his philosophy that Heaven-born, the Sahib, 
should see fit to waste perfectly good bottles, worth 
much in trade with the heathen, when gourds would 
do just as well! But it bored him — Allah, how it 
bored him! — even more than the thoughtless plaudits 
of these Papuan and Javanese swine who formed the 
crew of the proa! 

As if to make the South Sea setting of his shooting 
gallery perfect, a volcano of the Gilolo Group loomed 
out of the sea to port, as George peppered away at the 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 157 

dangling bottles. A perfect cone, its rock-clad peak 
rose out of a sea of green jungle, with a lazy column 
of smoke tumbling out of its crater. At its base, 
developing out of the clouds that hung on its flanks, 
they could make out the dim outlines of the island, 
the volcano dominating it all. 

George stopped shooting, his guns hanging at his 
sides. “Reminds me of a picture from my kid geog- 
raphy!” he muttered, puckering up his eyes from the 
glare of the sun on the sea. 

Just then a cry rang out from the lookouts forward. 
“Vela! Velaf-jurugan!” they yelled, tumbling aft, to 
surround the Javanese captain with violent gesticula- 
tions. Your Papuan is nothing if not excitable and 
violent, and an immense amount of palaver followed, 
as they pointed out to him a sail, a mere speck in the 
sea, over near the mainland. George recognized 
“Velcc” as the ancient Portuguese for sail, still current 
in these islands, but the rest was Greek to him, being 
all in Papuan. Suib stood aloof, a scornful smile 
curling his lips. 

“By the beard of the Prophet, Heaven-born, how 
these swine do chatter!” he exclaimed, turning to 
George. “They want the captain to ask you to put up 
your guns!” 

“Land’s sake — why ?” queried George, with an 
incredulous laugh. 

“Allah only knows !” retorted Suib. “It seems that 


158 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

this is a very dangerous part of the sea and they don’t 
want anything, like those pieces of bottles, dropped 
overboard, lest it should offend the hantus (spirits) 
down below. They take this strange sail coming for 
a proof that the spirits are angry.” 

George grinned as he sheathed his guns. “Anything 
to oblige the heathen!” he exclaimed, cheerfully. 

The strange proa was now well down inside the rim 
of the horizon and bearing down on them swiftly, its 
tall bamboo spars sticking up like the ends of a huge 
curved fan. The chattering among the crew increased 
as George sent Suib for his binoculars, while bows, 
spears and rattan shields made their appearance on 
deck forward. The Papuans buckled on their shields, 
each with a hole in the center through which an arm 
could be thrust, a flap protecting it, while the hand 
could grasp the bow, the eyes peering over the top of 
the shield. Soon fully half the crew were so armed, 
and thus the proa was got ready for battle, for any- 
thing might be expected of a strange sail in these seas. 

The jurugan (captain) came up to George anx- 
iously. “What do you see, Sahib? What sort of 
weapons do they carry?” he inquired nervously, as 
George searched the proa with his glasses. 

“She’s crowded with naked blacks,” advised George. 
“Some of them have long guns, and there seem to be 
lots of spears with toothed edges.” 

“At! Shark’s teeth! They are East Coasters — 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 159 

pirates !” cried out the captain, jumping up and down 
with fear and excitement. “Bajak! Bajak! (Pirates! 
Pirates !)” he yelled through cupped hands to his crew. 

A babel of guttural shouts answered him. Ancient, 
miquelet-lock, Singapore muskets were frantically 
loaded, and on the forward deck a wild war dance 
started. The crew of the proa numbered about thirty 
men, some of them Bugis and Javanese, most of them 
Papuans. 

“Looks like a very decent row coming off, Suib,” 
grinned George. “Get my .35 repeater out of my 
cabin, and bring all the ammunition we have.” 

Suib flashed white teeth of satisfaction. “As 
Heaven-born wills!” he nodded energetically. “Allah 
send that we come to strokes with them also!” he 
added, laying his hand on the jeweled hilt of his 
scimitar. He trotted to the little rattan hut on deck, 
which was George’s sleeping quarters, and soon 
returned with the two rifles. 

“Peace, if possible — fight, if we must, Captain,” 
said George, turning to the jurugan. “It is not well 
for the White Man to mix in native broils.” 

“There is never peace with pirates!” frowned the 
jurugan grimly. “However, I shall give them the 
peace sign, as the Sahib directs.” 

The hostile proa bore down close aboard, and then 
hauled her sail around, reversing her direction and 
thus strating herself off again on the other tack. Her 


160 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


wild crew yelled loudly, brandishing their weapons 
and answering the peace signals of the captain with 
derisive shouts. Then, at a sign from him, one of the 
Papuans leaned far out over the side, baptizing his 
mop of hair with sea water, the Islanders 1 universal 
sign for peace. His answer was a singing arrow of 
iron-wood, which stuck quivering in the gunwale, its 
head covered with backward-pointing barbs of shark’s 
teeth. 

“War! by Jerry!” barked George, quivering with 
excitement. “Here’s for that ugly buck up in the fore 
rigging!” The heavy rifle roared and the man spun 
like a top and dropped into the sea. An explosion of 
extravagant negro merriment arose from their own 
decks, and then the engagement became general, clouds 
of arrows and puffs of white smoke from the native 
Singapore muskets on both sides filling the air with the 
sharp spang and hiss of missiles. 

George kept pinching himself, dazed, unbelieving. 
He seemed to have been transported back to another 
century, to the days of Captain Cook. “Gee-roo ! A 
row like this in this enlightened twentieth century!” 
he muttered wonderingly as he lay below the proa’s 
bulwarks, sighting through a notch between the bam- 
boo railings. “Who’d have thought that anywhere in 
these islands you could really pick up a pirate ruc- 
tion !” 

“By the hair of Mohammed !” laughed Suib, whang- 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 161 


in g away with his long Arab gun. “It would be well 
not to leave one of these pigs alive !” he snorted with a 
true Mohammedan’s contempt for all Papuans and for- 
eigners. “That makes my fourth, Sahib ” as the 

gun spat again — “consider the headdress of yonder 
swine at the steering gear. Is it not the will of God 
that he should die?” he sniffed. 

The weapon spoke as he laughed, but the steersman 
made a sudden movement, which saved his life, for 
on the instant the hostile proa tacked again and soared 
toward them, evidently bent on ramming and getting 
to close quarters. 

“Now, Sahib — the steel!” grinned Suib, drawing his 
keen scimitar and making the air sing with it. George 
fired his rifle for the last time, and then jumped to his 
feet with the heavy, blue .38 in hand. 

There was a crash of bamboo on rattan as the two 
proas came together, and then a mad din as the pirates 
swarmed aboard, their faces, hideously tattooed, 
glaring over tall rattan shields. A peculiar, oval 
breast and neck guard of white boar’s tusks proclaimed 
them savages from the Tast Coast of New Guinea, 
still wild and cannibalistic. This guard, aided by stout 
shields that were musket-ball proof, was more or less 
effective against the spears and krisses of the Malays. 

The crew retreated around George and Suib, for 
with every bark of the six-gun a man fell, and Suib’s 
long scimitar flamed like a flash of light at the fore- 


1 62 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


front of the fray. Then the jurugan fell, with a long, 
jagged spear through his shoulder, and the battle raged 
hotter and hotter around the rattan house on deck. 

Then came an unlooked-for diversion, for four of 
their own steersmen had sneaked aboard the pirate 
proa through the steering hole in the side and a roar- 
ing sheet of flame swept up its mat sail. The pirates 
dashed back to their ship, followed closely by the 
leaders from the proa, still thrusting and stabbing 
with kriss and spear, Suib lunging at their head. 
George was forced to stop and reload his guns. Man is 
a primitive animal, he realized, as he crouched behind 
the house, virtually defenseless. With all his centuries 
of invention, the sword and the spear are still the only 
two weapons that keep on being effective in hand-to- 
hand fighting! 

Their own proa had now veered quite a distance 
away, and George took up the abandoned repeater, 
reloading it and putting in a handy shot now and then, 
but the fight was nearly over on the burning proa, for 
the survivors of the pirate crew were leaping over- 
board to save their lives and swimming off to bits of 
wreckage, pursued by clouds of arrows. She was now 
a roaring mass of flames, and the jurugan’ s people also 
left her, swimming valiantly back to their own ship, 
to clamber aboard with shouts of victory. Suib’s flam- 
ing turban was the last to arrive. 

“ Allah be praised — what a gorgeous fight, Sahib!” 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 163 

he chortled with glistening teeth. “Consider my nose, 
Heaven-born, and the eye of the jurumnddi (steers- 
man) — both are of a pulp, Sahib. But, by the grace 
of God, we have prevailed !” he ejaculated, crossing his 
palms piously. 

George got out his surgical kit and bound up the 
nose, which was smashed and torn from the blow of a 
war club. He then went to the jurugan , who lay 
wounded on deck. The long iron-wood spear, lined 
on both sides with barbs of shark’s teeth, protruded 
a foot beyond the captain’s shoulder. It could neither 
be withdrawn nor pulled through. George shook his 
head ; it seemed a hopeless case to him. 

But the native doctor, a grizzled old villain, black 
as soot and with a wooly mop of white hair, came up 
from cutting out arrows and spearheads from the 
crew and took charge. He ran a long, poniard-like 
knife down the spear, with its edge inward and the 
back facing the line of shark’s teeth. The Javanese 
captain bore it stoically, eyes closed, teeth clenched. 
Busily working with the primitive surgical instrument, 
the old medicine man pried the flesh away from both 
rows of barbs, sawed off the shaft end of the spear- 
head, and then, with a slow, undulating movement, he 
worked its head through the wound. Then a hot iron 
was brought up to sear the flesh. George turned away, 
sickened. He could not believe that a human being 
could bear such suffering. 


164 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

Suib curled his lip disdainfully. “It is nothing, 
Sahib. Soon he will have a fever, and then they will 
sweat him. After which — Pish! — an honorable 
scar ! . . . Ha !” he exclaimed suddenly, glancing over 
the side and then grabbing up the rifle, “there is yet 
one of those swine left alive !” 

He aimed for a black head bobbing in the water, its 
owner swimming towards them. George knocked up 
the gun. “Wait! Take him prisoner. I want to talk 
to him/’ he commanded. “Tell them not to shoot.” 

No one in the crew, however, was paying the least 
attention to the swimmer, so he and Suib were the sole 
reception committee. As the head came nearer they 
saw that its owner was but a child, a little black pica- 
ninny, surely not over eight years old. His little legs 
struck out like a frog’s, as he swam easily toward the 
proa, a genial negro grin smiling up at them confid- 
ingly. 

Suib drew his sword, as the tiny muscular hands 
clawed at the bamboo bulwarks, and he aimed a cut 
across their knuckles. 

“Don’t!” commanded George. “I forbid it!” 

“It is but a child, Heaven-born, and babies are cheap 
and too plentiful as it is,” retorted Suib, sulkily. 
“This one will be a mere nuisance. I opined that it 
was the will of Allah that he should die.” 

“Help me up with him,” ordered George, grabbing 
a round, sturdy little arm. “And now go get an inter- 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 165 

preter,” for neither he nor Suib could make out the 
gibberish the youngster was jabbering at them. 

Presently one of the crew came up, and after a vast 
amount of talk, Suib turned to George. “He says he 
was captured off a Goram proa, Sahib, and all his 
people were killed, but they kept him.” 

“What for, for goodness’ sake!” demanded George 
wonderingly. 

Suib hung his head sheepishly. “To eat him, 
Heaven-born,” he grinned, as George flushed with a 
white man’s repulsion at the thought. “It is the custom 
with these swine, though it is an order of the Govern- 
ment that it shall be taboo.” 

George sat stunned. Somehow he had been wont 
to consider cannibalism as a relic of Robinson Crusoe 
times. Now the fact was driven in upon him that men 
still ate their enemies with relish. He recalled the story 
going about Amboina when he left, of that native who 
killed and ate his wife only the year before “because 
him talk’m plenty, too much,” and so bored him ! The 
native judge, too, had given him a verdict of justifi- 
able homicide in self-defense, and Amboina had voted 
it a huge joke, the whites hardly crediting it at all, 
until the missionaries had confirmed the tale. It 
seemed unbelievable, for the year 1901, so accustomed 
are we to our civilization and steamships. 

“However,” went on Suib, imperturbably, “the 
child jumped overboard and swam away while we were 


1 66 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


fighting — and here he is. Shall we not cast him into 
the sea again, Heaven-born, now that the Sahib is 
through with him? ,, he asked, seizing the child’s arm 
eagerly. But the little fellow bit and kicked vigorously, 
squirming away from Suib and twining himself 
around George’s legs. 

‘‘Heavens, no!” gasped George, soothing the young- 
ster’s screams. “Sometimes, Suib, you lose your grip 
on the humanities altogether — you sure do !” 

Suib looked blank, but salaamed reverently. “It is 
as Heaven-born wills,” he replied, resignedly. “What, 
then, will the Sahib do with him?” 

“Do ? I shall adopt him, of course ! Maybe we can 
find his people when we get to Wairibi. Give him 
something to eat — no — bring here something,” he 
corrected himself, as the child began to scream again, 
objecting most valiantly to being torn from his newly 
discovered protector. 

While Suib was attending to the little castaway, the 
crew hauled in tack and sheet and veered the proa on 
her course again. The tropic twilight fell swiftly as 
they billowed across the calm Molucca seas, while in 
the darkness eddying streams of phosphorescent light 
rushed past the rudder blades in whirling sparks of 
fire. All that the steersmen, the jurumuddis, had to 
steer by was an obscure angle in their heads laid across 
the long windrows of the seas, but with it they set a 
course as true as if laid out on a chart and held to by 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 167 

a rhumb line of a compass. During the monsoon the 
angle of the waves never varied ; it was their compass, 
day and night. The sole other navigating instrument 
was half an empty cocoanut shell, floating in a bucket 
of water on deck. It had a tiny hole in its bottom, and 
sank in just one hour, when it was emptied and set 
afloat again, thus giving the hours of distance sailed. 

The captain had a fever, as Suib had predicted, and 
got over it amazingly, as the calm days went by and 
the proa dipped over the smooth seas on her trip to 
Wairibi. Day after day slipped by, until over the hori- 
zon to the east appeared a cloud bank that became per- 
manent. It was Wairibi and the roadstead of Aiou. 

A palm-fringed beach, with low, jungle-clad hills 
rising gently back of it, developed out of the mists 
on the sea, and presently the proa ran into a cove and 
drove her nose up on the sand, until the bow stuck out 
into the main street of Aiou between two palm-thatch 
huts built just above tidewater. 

A crowd of native Papuans, Javanese, and Chinese 
traders surrounded them in a shouting, gesticulating 
crowd, as they stepped ashore. This trading settlement 
of Wairibi, George noted, was situated on a spit of 
sand, with anchorages among the coral reefs on both 
sides, so it was available for either the east or west 
monsoons. George’s curious gaze roved down the 
length of its single street, lined on both sides with 
queer, peak-roofed bamboo-thatch houses, with tall 


1 68 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


cocoanut palms like huge green feather dusters, grow- 
ing up here and there, and the noses of seagoing proas 
projecting out into the street between the houses. And 
back of it lay the trackless jungle, the blakang tana , 
full of savages, a land almost unexplored, except along 
a small number of short river banks. 

He and Suib were given the empty Government 
house at the end of the street, and for an hour they 
did nothing but watch the animated scene going on 
down its crowded length. Each house door swung, 
not on side hinges, but on ones made of rattan, at the 
top, so it could be raised up and held out as a sort of 
porch by a couple of stakes. Under it lounged its 
owner, here a Javanese, with peaked hat, bargaining 
with a naked savage for a bundle of sugarcane; yon- 
der a Chinaman, in loose blue dress, with long glossy 
black queue, arguing with a tall, wooly-haired black 
chieftain over the amount of tripang to be traded for a 
brass gun; a little farther on a Bugis sailor was chip- 
ping with an adz at a proa plank for boat repairs ; in the 
distance a hunter was coming into town from the 
jungle, with spear over shoulder and a cuscus, or native 
opossum, dangling in his hand. People squatted 
everywhere in the center of the street, gambling, cock 
fighting, working at pandanus-leaf boxes, washing 
sago — every one’s business was in everybody’s way! 
For domestic animals, a kangaroo, two tame bobos , 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 169 


some fowls, and a pig or two wandered at will through 
the town. 

One thing, however, George missed — the unre- 
strained, light-hearted, negro merriment characteristic 
of the Papuans. There seemed to be an air of dread, 
of repression about the place. Men looked over their 
shoulders, glanced furtively around buildings, and 
what children there were in the place kept close to the 
verandas. George first thought that it was due to the 
presence of traders and such a large admixture of for- 
eign Chinese and Javanese, but that couldn't have been 
— the Papuan character is too irrepressible to be in the 
least abashed at the presence of strangers. 

“What is the matter with this place. Suib?” he at 
length asked, turning to his gun bearer for advice. 
“These people do not seem happy — they are afraid to 
laugh." 

Suib, who was bored, slowly smiled and yawned 
indifferently. “Sahib, one says that there is war 
with the blakang tarn. It is as Allah wills — these pigs 
are always quarreling. They tell me the white sahib 
of the place will return about evening, and then it shall 
be known." 

“Well, let's get the collecting shelves ready anyway. 
It would be rather amusing to have to mix in a scrim- 
mage before we can get in to collect at all — you'd like 
that, eh, Suib?" 

Suib showed his shapely white teeth. “Anything, 


170 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

Heaven-born,” he grinned, “rather than rot here, and 
— Allah!” he yawned again — “grow fat!” 

As the westering sun dropped behind the palms, a 
more than usual bustle in the village told of the arrival 
of the White Man, the only English trader in the place. 
George and Suib remained at work, remembering the 
first law of Oriental diplomacy, which is to make the 
other man come to you. In half an hour a footstep 
on the bamboo porch warned them of a caller, and 
George stepped out, to greet the little, wiry, weather- 
beaten English trader. He wore a Japanese bowl hat, 
the inevitable tropic whites, and the inevitable monocle 
of his tribe. George, tall, slender and muscular, in 
khaki and puttees, with his keen, youthful American 
features glowing ruddily under a pith helmet, towered 
above the little man from the British Isles. 

“Barton Kegley’s my name. Heard you were here. 
What's the news ?” chopped out the trader, pithily. 

“None. Met a pirate proa on the way up from 
Amboina and had the very devil of a row with them, 
but we made a clean-up,” laughed George. “Come in, 
and have something.” 

Kegley stumped inside and slumped into a wicker 
chair. “Pirates, eh? Jolly go, that! Jobie coasters, 
no doubt ; the Dutch gunboat keeps after them pretty 
steadily, but it’s rather impossible for her to catch 
them at it. Hit this place about eleven years ago. 
None since. Doing a bit of collecting, eh?” he ven- 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 171 

tured, looking around the room. “Interesting work — > 
rather, I should say!” 

“You bet it is !” came back George, enthusiastically. 
“I’m after some paradise birds for the Sultan. But 
say, man, what’s the matter with these people here? 
They seem terror-struck or something. I’ve never 
seen anything like it in all my travels in the Islands. 
You expecting a pirate raid here?” 

“No. You never expect pirates. They happen. 
But we have our own troubles, too. It’s rather a rum 
go!” laughed Kegley. “These benighted heathen have 
a Great Karwar, a sort of head idol, set up in a shrine 
back in the blakang tana, and the old boy is offended — 
horrid mess! Rather!” he chuckled. “For these 
chaps all believe it, devoutly, and are doing poojaJi 
before his shrine like good ’uns. Timore, the head 
chief, is sick — that’s proof enough that the idol’s 
squiffy, y’see! And all the priests and sorcerers are 
jolly busy, looking for the right party to offer up to 
appease the Karwar. That’s why these chaps here are 
all in a blue funk.” 

“How so?” inquired George interestedly. “What’s 
the danger ?” 

“Human sacrifice,” puffed Kegley coolly. “We have 
it here, in these regions, even yet. Missionaries pre- 
ferred. Oh, this head Karwar is no end of a brute ! 
Carved out of a solid tree trunk, and — well, you’ve seen 
the Fiji type — glaring mother-of-pearl eyes; hideous 


172 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

mouth, with cowrie shell teeth that open and shut by a 
string pulled by the priests, and all that. These people 
are all scared to death of it, because it has a ‘tongue of 
death/ they vow. The victim is held up before it, and 
something — its tongue, they say — darts out of the 
mouth and strikes him, and the poor devil dies in hor- 
rible agony. Cobra, most likely, kept inside the idol — 
but it works fine.” 

“Huh!” exclaimed George. “So that's the trouble 
I’ve heard rumors of, eh? It’s safe for us to hunt in 
the interior, of course? White men, under Govern- 
ment auspices, and all that, you know." 

“Oh, sure! You’re all right, you’re white/’ agreed 
Kegley. “A Government expedition put the fear of 
God — with dynamite — into these niggers about forty 
years back — and they haven’t forgotten. Old Timor e 
has really nothing but a fit of stomach-ache, from too 
much swilling, don’t you know, but they’ll top it off 
with a human sacrifice before it’s all over, and you’d 
better play safe for a bit. And I’d rather keep an eye 
on the young-un there’’ — indicating the picaninny, Ali 
— “and keep him close at home, for they’re liable to 
pick just him for the victim.’’ 

The hair rose on the back of George’s neck at the 
thought. He had become greatly attached to Ali, and 
counted on him as a permanent addition to his official 
family, unless by chance his people should turn up. 
But that this little, adorable, grinning imp, in the inno- 


IN QUEST OF PARADISE BIRDS 173 

cence of his eight short years of life, should be torn 
from him and offered up in some diabolical rite, for 
the benefit of a bloated potentate of whom he knew 
nothing and cared less — how the fighting blood boiled 
in him at the idea ! Suib, too, smiled scornfully. He 
only just tolerated Ali, but still, anything that was 
George Sahib’s was sacred! 

“Deuced amusing!” laughed George shortly. “I 
hadn’t intended to, Kegley, but I just guess I’ll have 
to pack my guns in these parts.” 

“Do!” interjected Kegley. “You might need them, 
you know. There isn’t an ounce of real vice in these 
beggars, you know, except when they get practical 
about their religion. For my part I’d like to go up 
there and throw about two pounds of purgative salts 
into old Timore, but trade is trade, and I’ve got to 
stick here. Well, I must be off!” he concluded, rising 
suddenly, and he strolled away down the village street. 

“Suib,” said George, turning to his gun bearer, 
“you watch Ali closely from now on. Don’t let him 
get out of your sight.” 


CHAPTER VIII 


RAJAH GEORGE 

Since the season of the “sacaleli,” the plumage dance 
of the birds of paradise, was in full swing when George, 
accompanied by Suib and the waif Ali, landed at the 
village of Wairibi, he lost no time in engaging a native 
hunter to guide them into the interior. There, at his 
command, the men built a palm-leaf hut for a three 
days* stay until some specimens of the birds should be 
secured. The men of Wairibi are all expert archers, 
and it was decided to let the native shoot the paradise 
birds in the time-honored fashion, from under a canopy 
of leaves built up in the tree where they hold their 
dances. This was done with a blunt-headed arrow, 
and Ali was detailed to lie in wait down in the forest, 
to pick up the stunned birds and kill them without in- 
juring their plumage. 

There are some eighteen species of paradise birds, 
all exquisitely beautiful. Only one, the lesser bird of 
paradise, is abundant enough to form an article of 
commerce, and it is known to civilization as the stock 
bird of the milliner. Of the many other species, Suib 
174 


RAJAH GEORGE 


175 


brought in the first example within an hour after the 
palm-leaf hut was built. As gorgeous and beautiful 
as the Mussulman Suib himself, this bird, the king 
bird of paradise, seemed to George as it lay in his palm 
the most wonderful object he ever laid eyes on. Of 
an intense cinnabar red, with a gloss as of spun glass, 
the prevailing red plumage shaded to rich orange on 
the head, while across the throat swung a necklace of 
vivid metallic green. Below this, the breast was of 
fine white spun silk, while from each side of the breast 
sprang little tufts of grayish feathers about two inches 
long, terminated by broad bands of intense emerald 
green. Doubtless the Lord may have made a more 
beautiful bird, but doubtless also He never intended 
such for the eyes of civilized man, thought George, 
for just to see it would arouse the predatory posses- 
sive instincts of the white man, and the very existence 
of such a bird would be incompatible with civilization. 
Too many Eves would want to put it in their hats, 
reflected George, as he examined the feathered gem 
with wondering murmurs of delight — to Suib’s intense 
amusement ! 

Early before the next dawn, they were awakened 
by the “Wawk-wawk-wawk ! — Wok, wok, wok!” echo- 
ing through the forest of the birds of paradise on their 
way to morning feeding. Following them the jungle 
awoke to life, the shrill cries of the lories and parra- 
keets, the scream of the cockatoos, the croak of the 


176 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

king-hunter, the chirp and whistle of the smaller birds. 
George arose for another day’s wanderings through 
fairyland, to find Suib already pottering over the camp 
kettle. Ali had long since gone with the native hunter 
to the bird of paradise rendezvous. 

On this second day an uncanny sixth sense told him 
that they were not alone in the forest. George, stand- 
ing silent for long periods of time watching the habits 
of birds overhead, would note rustlings, faint noises, 
inexplainable movements in the bushes, and strange 
calls or signals, which, even unfamiliar as he was with 
the jungle cries, seemed somehow to come from human 
throats. Knowing that the Papuans wished a human 
sacrifice for the great Karwar, he began to worry 
about the safety of Ali. If the wild men of the hills 
were shadowing them, it would be easy for them to 
kidnap the lonely child, waiting bravely alone in the 
forest for the game that might fall to the native hunter. 

Soon Suib came back from a scout, his bag laden 
with fresh specimens, carefully wrapped in pandanus 
leaves. “Plenty bad men yonder, Sahib,” he an- 
swered warily. “The orang-kaya’s very sick, and his 
people are still on the war-path. Come, Heaven-born, 
and I will show you something l” 

He led the way to a little, open glade, where was a 
patch of bare clay sand. Fresh footsteps, of naked, 
splay-toed feet, led across it ! 

“H-mm!” mused George. “We’ll have to mount 


RAJAH GEORGE 177 

guard to-night, and get back to Wairibi to-morrow, 
until this thing blows over, eh, Suib?” 

“I followed this track, Sahib, and I saw him,” de- 
clared Suib, ominously. “A tall, black man, with long 
frizzled hair, tattooed all over, as the way with these 
foreigners. He went along like a shadow, Heaven- 
born, and he was watching — following — you! He 
wore a necklace of kangaroo teeth — a warrior — and 
carried a long black bow. I should have slain him,” 
yawned Suib nonchalantly, “except that there was no 
order from the Sahib. Shall we hunt these swine 
ourselves, then? Say but the word, Sahib.” 

“No; it ill becomes the White Man to make war on 
black savages. The Government would not approve, 
Suib. We must guard Ali, though, to-night, and get 
out of here to-morrow.” 

Suib salaamed. “It is as Heaven-born wishes,” he 
murmured. “Shall I take the midnight watch?” 

“Yes. Pay no attention to them at present — let’s on 
with our work, while there is yet time.” 

They separated, now and then shooting down a new 
bird, always with a wary eye on the silent and inscru- 
table jungle. The native hunter and Ali returned at 
nightfall, to George’s intense relief. They brought 
four perfect specimens of the bird of paradise, in full 
plumage. Far into the night they were occupied in 
skinning the day’s trophies and in making notes on the 
crop contents, and then Suib, with a tired grunt, rolled 


178 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

into his blankets and slept beside the childish figure 
of Ali, huddled on a mat of palm bark. The fire burnt 
low and the moon rose, flooding the jungle with sil- 
very light, as George wrote busily by candlelight in 
his notebook. No hostile sound had as yet come to his 
ears. Night prowlers were absent from these islands ; 
most of the jungle noises were of night birds, insects, 
the rustlings of small marsupial animals that corre- 
spond to our rats and mice — there was nothing to 
cause him to lay hand on the pearl butt of the long 
.38, snug in its holster. The sacred sovereignty of the 
White Man, George decided, lay over and protected 
him and his. 

At the second hour after midnight, George, with a 
light-hearted sigh of relief, went over to the huddled 
form of Suib in the dark shadows of the hut. He 
stooped to shake him, then drew back with a swift 
curse of alarm. There was but one figure lying on the 
mat — and that was Suib’s ! The child was gone ! 

George froze with horror. Nothing but the majesty 
of the invisible white Government had protected his 
own life, then! The wild men of the hills had stolen 
the child under his very nose, with a stealth and cun- 
ning that had put his dull senses to shame ! 

“Suib! Suib! Wake up!” he whispered fiercely, 
boring into the Mohammedan’s ribs with his knuckles. 
“Ali’s gone!” 


179 


RAJAH GEORGE 

“Name of the Prophet! — What's wrong, Sahib?" 
grunted Suib, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “Who 
— where is the little native?" 

“Ali’s gone! Stolen! We must act quickly — get 
up!" hissed George. 

“It is Kismet !" returned Suib, shrugging his shoul- 
ders stoically. “I opined that it was the will of Allah 
that this little one should die. In India there are a 
million more babies — let the hill men have this one, 
Heaven-born," he pleaded, sleepily. 

“No! The Sahib wills otherwise," said George 
firmly. “This chico is mine, and until returned to his 
mother, it is against the White Man’s izzat (honor) 
to abandon him. Come, wake up the hunter and we’ll 
go to the head chief’s village." 

“As the Sahib wills!" muttered Suib sulkily. “Per- 
haps there will yet be a fight!" he added, brightening 
up as he went to wake the native. 

That night march was long to remain a thrilling 
memory to George. For an interminable time they 
followed the native through the trackless, moonlit jun- 
gle, finally reaching a broad trail which was doubtless 
the main road to the village. Mile after mile they 
sped down it, hour after hour, while slowly the moon 
set, leaving them in the intense darkness before dawn. 
Then, far ahead over the jungle, showed the red light 
of a huge fire, reflected against the sky line, and George 
hurried his men on the faster, for he dreaded that he 


180 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


was already too late. Muffled, from afar, came the 
infernal beat of tom-toms — monotonous, ceaseless, 
maddening to his impatient ears. How long the pre- 
liminary ceremonies might last he could not but guess, 
but they would be some time about it, he was sure, for 
the medicine men would find it essential to work up 
the right pitch of voodooism to get the tribe’s coun- 
tenance for an act that was against the Government’s 
taboo. 

As to the “tongue of death,” George could easily 
picture it. He had once watched a king cobra being 
fed in its glass case at a zoological park. At the first 
movement of opening the rear door, this diabolical 
serpent had sprung to striking position, ready on the 
instant to kill the hand that fed him. George had 
never forgotten that scene, the cobra, arched, ready, 
motionless, waiting minute after minute for the door 
to open. Then a tiny crack appeared in the back of 
the wooden case. It opened but a fraction of an inch 
and the cobra, baffled, struck furiously at it, while a 
tiny green lizard slipped unnoticed through the crack 
into the case. For hours the cobra remained motion- 
less, ready to strike again, before it deigned to notice 
its hapless meal. Some such infernal creature was 
doubtless kept in the hollow body of the Karwar, 
brought from India by the priests, for cobras are un- 
known in the Archipelago. George could easily imag- 
ine the superstitious fear that such an idol would instill 


RAJAH GEORGE 


181 


in the natives ; an idol whose very visage spelled instant 
and agonizing death — such a death as would be Ali’s, 
unless he acted quickly! 

As the faint light of early dawn dimmed the glow 
of stars and fire alike, the road led up toward the last 
ridge, whereon was the village of the orang-kaya. The 
devilish drubbing of tom-toms, the deep booming of 
bamboo drums redoubled; a vile squealing of flutes 
and the nasal whang of stringed instruments came to 
their ears, along with the indescribable croonings of 
a crowd of natives roused to the highest pitch of 
fanaticism. A vast throng of wooly heads squatted 
in a great semicircle before a bamboo shrine, under 
which frowned the distorted visage of a huge, wooden 
idol, hideously carved and feathered, and jeweled all 
over with fantastic designs of mother-of-pearl and 
cowrie shells. A circle of priests, in momo masks, 
chanted with upflung arms before it, while to the right 
and left were rows of drummers and musicians. Old 
Timore, bloated and bestial, lounged on a raised 
throne, his chin resting on a heavily braceleted arm, 
his eyes bloodshot and swollen, his lips disfigured and 
his teeth blackened with excess of betel-nut chewing. 

On a high stool before the idol, stood the head priest, 
and George, sobbing with horror as he strode down 
into the center of the throng facing the idol, noted 
that he held Ali in his arms, while two assistant priests 


1 82 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


were already tapping the idol’s breast with feathered 
wands. 

The child seemed to be doped, for he offered no 
resistance and his little wooly head fell sleepily on the 
priest’s shoulder. As George stepped in front of the 
idol, the priest raised Ali a second time before the 
hideous visage, chanting in dreary monotone the while. 
Then, as he prepared to raise him a third time, the 
idol’s teeth parted, disclosing a dim, motionless shape 
within. 

With the quick flash of the gunman’s swing, 
George’s Colt leaped from its holster, poised an instant 
at a dim mark of two tiny points of fire, and then 
roared out, just as the priest had raised a fat chubby 
arm up to the idol’s mouth. 

There was a hollow smash of broken wood, and a 
violent thumping inside. Then a hundred natives 
jumped to their feet in a deafening uproar. Timore 
staggered angrily to his feet, and seized a huge flat- 
bladed spear. George’s gun swung around, and the 
weapon was struck from his hand, as twenty warriors 
around the throne sprang for their weapons. '‘Kill! 
Shall we kill, Sahib?” whispered Suib, flashing out his 
scimitar, on tiptoe with eagerness. 

“Stop!” called out George, using what little Papuan 
he possessed. “Timore — this is tapu!” — waving his 
hand at the idol — “The fire proa (gunboat), the sol- 


RAJAH GEORGE 183 

diers, will come, if the governor hears of this ! Shame 
on you, Timore!” 

The old chief blinked at him stupidly, quieting his 
warriors with a wave of his hand. “Evil spirits pos- 
sess me, and would take my life,” he pleaded shakily. 
“The Karwar is very greatly angry, Sahib. He must 
be appeased.” 

“Your Karwar is dead! I, the Government, have 
killed him!” proclaimed George. “His tongue of 
death is gone!” 

An angry shout from the priests greeted these words. 
The head priest danced about with yells of fury, ges- 
ticulating violently at George and chattering rapidly 
at Timore. 

“What is he saying, Suib?” asked George, coolly, 
taking a cigarette from his silver case and lighting it 
carefully. 

“He says the Karwar is not dead — he is more angry 
than ever,” translated Suib. “He says that you , Sahib, 
must be offered up to appease him.” 

“Tell Timore, Suib, that I shall utterly destroy the 
Karwar — and I shall utterly destroy him , too, if he 
does not obey the orders of the Government,” said 
George, glaring at the head priest. 

Suib translated rapidly, as George opened the flap 
of a canvas pocket on his belt and drew therefrom a 
small, shiny, nickel-plated object. A shout of rage 
from the throng greeted Suib’s words. A hundred 


184 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

warriors brandished their spears, and looked to Timore 
for an order. George touched the nickel-plated cylin- 
der to his cigarette point and cast it quickly at the 
hideous Karwar. 

Brr-angg ! ! — There was a blinding, white flash and 
a tremendous detonation, as the walls of the shrine 
blew apart and the Karwar disappeared in a riven mess 
of splinters. Of the head priest there was not a 
vestige left; the floor where he stood was gone; a 
single arm, like a boomerang, flew across space and 
landed in the top of a cocoanut palm fifty feet above 
the heads of the natives. 

The crowd stood aghast, stunned, watching George 
fearsomely, who stood with a second cylinder in his 
hand, eyeing Timore grimly. 

“It is enough!” croaked the old chief, stooping with 
trembling hand to pour dirt on his head in token of 
submission. “Only let the White Man not let loose 
his thunders upon us! My people are as children at 
fighting, as compared to the White Men! I know! 
Tve seen it! His devil-devil is very strong!” 

George caught most of his meaning. “Tell him, 
Suib, that I, the Government, will now drive out his 
evil spirit and cure him. Let them bring me a bowl 
of kava.” 

He caught Suib’s wondering eye fastened on him, 
as he replaced the other little, shiny cylinder in its 
pocket. That it was but a shaving-stick tin, filled with 


RAJAH GEORGE 


i85 

dynamite and provided with a short fuse — he did not 
see fit to enlighten Suib. He dug out his fever kit, 
and rolled a pellet of calomel and another of aconite 
into his palm as Suib turned to the chief. Flames 
arose around the ruins of the shrine, but no one dared 
touch them, and presently a medicine man, on all fours, 
crawled to George, pushing a bowl of kava before him. 
George made what he considered sufficiently impres- 
sive incantations over it and dropped in the pellets. 
Timore drank the bowl greedily, and then sank back 
exhausted in his chair. 

Then George felt something tugging at his feet, 
and, looking down, he perceived a native woman, 
crawling before him. 

“Speak to her, Suib, what does she want ?” he asked. 
“I can’t spare any more medicines ; she must come to 
Wairibi.” 

Suib grinned, and after the exchange of a few words 
— “She is the mother of Ali, Sahib,” he smiled softly. 
“She w T ants him back. The priests still have him — 
bound.” 

“Fetch him here !” ordered George, pointing at the 
knot of priests, who were watching Timore with 
anxious faces. 

“Cut !” he commanded. “Since when has the black 
man dared bind !” A dozen knives made haste to cut 
the ceremonial bandages about Ali. George took the 
child tenderly into his arms, kissed him, and handed 


186 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


him to his mother, who smothered the little fellow in 
her embraces. 

“Good-by, old chappie !” he muttered huskily. “Re- 
member the White Man when you grow up, old fel- 
low! Come, Suib, get hold of the native hunter and 
le’s get back to camp, or the ants will have eaten all 
our specimens.” 

A murmur arose from the crowd as they turned to 
go. “What are they saying, Suib?” George inquired 
quickly. 

“He sleeps, Sahib! The chief sleeps! — for the first 
time in a week! Your devil-devil is working, Heaven- 
born,” said Suib, adoringly. “I know something of 
the power of the White Man myself — verily he holds 
the keys of the seven heavens and the seven gehennas ! 
Come, let us go!” 

A powerful war chief pushed through the throng 
and touched Suib on the shoulder. With a few words 
he handed him a necklace of the claws of the tree kan- 
garoo, pointing at George. 

“It is for you, Sahib. No one but a free warrior 
- may wear it. The tribe adopts you as a chief, and 
wishes you good hunting!” 

“Good!” exclaimed George, cordially, and, seizing 
the war chief’s arms, he rubbed noses with him. In- 
stantly the tribe burst into extravagant, boisterous 
Papuan merriment, happy and carefree as is their 
accustomed character. George and Suib set off down 


RAJAH GEORGE 


187 


the trail, accompanied by an army of singing, tumbling, 
gleeful savages — whose dreaded Karwar was destroyed 
and whose chief was cured. The hunter was des- 
patched to camp with a band of helpers to bring in the 
specimens. 

When George's army melted noiselessly away, like 
partridges in the forest, George knew that he was 
approaching Wairibi. 

Kegley came out to meet him. “Heard you had the 
devil’s own row, up at the village,” grinned that worthy 
gentleman. 

“Sure !” laughed George. “Had to gentle ’em a bit. 
Dynamited the Karwar, cured old Timore, and mussed 
up a perfectly good medicine man. But I’d hate to 
have these people shot up by a lot of soldiers on my 
account. As you say, they are nothing but children, 
and there isn’t a scrap of real badness in them.” 

“Rather ! My word, but you must tell me all about 
it, old chap!” quoth Kegley, leading the way to his 
bungalow. 

George told him the whole story, Kegley, listening 
intently, now and then interrupting to purr, “Splen- 
did! Splen-did!” in a thick Northumbrian growl. 

“I say, old chap, you’re just the type we want here, 
don’tyerknow !” he exclaimed, as George finished. This 
place is getting to be too big a trading settlement 
to be subject to these eternal rows up-country, and 


1 88 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 


pirate raids we know not when. How would you like 
to be the Rajah of this district?” 

“Why not you, sir?” queried George, too astonished 
to do more than gasp. 

“I’d agree to, only I cawn’t stay here, dear boy. My 
work takes me all over these seas, a month at this 
island, a month somewhere else. It needs a young 
energetic fellow like you, old chap. If you’ll let me, 
I’d be delighted to ask for your appointment, you 
know.” 

George thought of their happy wanderings on the 
Mauie , and of his mother coming out soon to Batavia, 
and shook his head. 

“I really couldn’t, sir — thank you ever so much, all 
the same,” he replied earnestly. “I’m expecting my 
mother out soon, and my father, Captain Sloan, needs 
me on our steamer — no, I’m afraid I couldn’t, sir,” 
he demurred. 

Kegley purred as he stroked his long white mus- 
tache. "It’s the White Man’s burden, old chap,” he 
said at length. "We’ve all got to do our bit, out here. 
I’ve done mine: When I was your age I was a cadet 
in the North Borneo service — had a troop of native 
soldiers and policed a territory half as large as dear 
old England herself. Why not build a residency, here, 
and have your mother with you, at headquarters ? This 
island is far cooler and more salubrious than any part 
of the Archipelago. We have the Pacific breezes — 


RAJAH GEORGE 189 

look what a fine, clean, breezy place this settlement is, 
man!” 

George had to admit that it was farther from the 
humid belt and nearer the vast, cool Pacific than in 
among the hot islands. His mother, he knew, would 
want to be near him. The Cap’n would be here and 
there, all over the Archipelago in the Mauie, dropping 
in on them occasionally, but a woman would soon 
tire of the small quarters on shipboard. She would 
want a house of her own. Why not here? They 
could visit civilization, at any time, in the Mauie. 
Near him would be home, to her. It did not look so 
bad, if the Cap’n would consent — which George knew 
he would! 

“All right, sir ,” said he at length, “Suppose you try 
your hand, and meanwhile I’ll write the Cap’n.” 

Suib sailed next day in the proa, while George went 
up to re-visit Timore and get on friendly relations 
with the inland tribes. Before he knew it, he was 
already installed as a court of justice and doctor of 
numerous ailments of an ignorant and helpless people. 
The pity of it all grew on him. These savages were 
mere children. Their “law” complaints were ludi- 
crous, yet very real to them ; their diseases were noth- 
ing before quinine and laxatives, yet people died of 
simple intermittent fever, lacking any remedy at all. 
This work, dealing with human beings, grew on him. 
He was more than ready, when the Mauie herself hove 


190 THE CASTAWAYS OF BANDA SEA 

in sight off the coral reefs and anchored in the sandy 
bay of Wairibi. 

The Cap’n came ashore with an official of the Dutch 
Resident. “Son — congratulations!” he beamed, as he 
strode up to George with outstretched hand. “We’ve 
been busy over at Amboina — my stars, but we have, 
son!” He handed George an official document, and 
introduced the Dutch official, who, as usual, spoke 
English fluently. 

“It’s a fine work, my young friend, that you have 
agreed to do for us !” said the latter. “The Resident 
was much pleased with Suib’s report of how you 
handled this affair. He appoints you Rajah of this 
district, which includes this island and the large ones 
of Sook and Biak adjoining. Jobie Island is so bad 
that we shall have to take care of it ourselves. But 
we feel that we can trust you here.” 

“How’s that, Rajah George!” chuckled the Cap’n, 
“you are to train a police force, and act as adviser to 
this old chief — Timore, ain’t it? — and there’s an appro- 
priation of five thousand guilders to build a strong 
fortified Residency, right here.” 

“Great!” grinned George. “I’ve been up with 
Timore all this last week, holdin’ court, and doctorin’ 
his people. No trouble at all to pick up a set of young 
natives for police ! Can I have a proa, sir, for visiting 
the other islands?” he asked, addressing the Dutch 
official. 


RAJAH GEORGE 


191 

“It has been arranged for. An armed one, with 
two cannon,” smiled the latter. “You can start right 
in cleaning up the district.” 

“My word!” grinned Kegley. “And, young-un, 
I don’t know of a better man than just you for it, 
either! — Rajah Sloan, if you please!” 

“And now, gentlemen,” wheezed the Cap’n, “I gotto 
borry him for a few weeks. His mother’s coming out 
to Batavia, and I reckon her cornin’ ’ll jest be about 
spoilt without her boy to meet her — eh?” 

The others nodded assent. George felt that this 
was rather a good old world ! His elders were giving 
him their confidence and trust in managing the na- 
tives — seemed willing to do anything in the world for 
him! 

“You just run along, young-un,” beamed Kegley. 
“I’ll go up to see Timore about some workmen, and 
I’ll look after putting up your Residency while you're 
gone. I cawn’t promise it’ll be done — natives being 
what they are — but we’ll have something for you to 
look at by the time you get back— my word on it!” 

“All right — le’s go, father,” said George, looking 
longingly out to where the Mauie lay at anchor. 
“We’ll pick up Migi off Borneo. I want mother to 
know him. Besides,” he grinned, “he’s not the only 
one of us that’s runnin’ things — now!” 












































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